paid, I guess. It would have suited _me_ better, and I guess
it would have suited better all round."

Her voice betrayed a struggle between offended dignity and decided
crossness. Rose was a little hysterical, Graeme thought, or she never
would have laughed about such an important matter in Hannah's face. For
Hannah knew her own value, which was not small in the household, and she
was not easily propitiated when a slight was given or imagined, as no
one knew better than Rose. And before company, too!--company with whom
Hannah had not been "made acquainted," as Hannah, and the sisterhood
generally in Merleville, as a rule, claimed to be. It was dreadful
temerity on Rose's part.

"Oh! Hannah, I forgot all about it."

But the door was suddenly closed. Rose hastened after her in haste and
confusion.

Mr Snow had been deeply meditating, and he was evidently not aware that
anything particular had been happening, for he turned suddenly to Mr
Millar, and said,--

"I understood that it was you who was--eh--who was--keeping company with
Miss Roxbury?"

"Did you think so, Miss Elliott," said Charlie, in some astonishment.

"Mr Snow," said his wife, in a voice that brought him to her side in an
instant. "You may have read in the Book, how there is a time to keep
silence, as well as a time to speak, and the bairn had no thought of
having her words repeated again, though she might have said that to
you."

She spoke very softly, so that the others did not hear, and Mr Snow
would have looked penitent, if he had not looked so bewildered. Raising
her voice a little, she added,--

"You might just go out, and tell Hannah to send Jabez over to Emily's
about the yeast, if she has taken too many steps to go herself; for Miss
Rose is tired, and it is growing dark;--and besides, there is no call
for her to go Hannah's messages--though you may as well no' say that to
her, either."

But the door opened, and Rose came in again.

"I can't even find the jug," she said, pretending great consternation.
"And this is the second one I have been the death of. Oh! here it is.
I must have left it here in the morning, and wee Rosie's flowers are in
it! Oh! yes, dear, I must go. Hannah is going, and I must go with her.
She is just a little bit cross, you know. And, besides, I want to tell
her the news," and she went away.

Mr Snow, feeling that he had, in some way, been compromising himself,
went and sat down beside his wife, to b