o visit to Miss Le Smyrger's house on that afternoon; but
she might have known something of Captain Broughton's approach without
going thither. His road to the Colne passed by the parsonage-gate, and
had Patience sat even at her bedroom window she must have seen him. But
on such an evening she would not sit at her bedroom window;--she would
do nothing which would force her to accuse herself of a restless longing
for her lover's coming. It was for him to seek her. If he chose to do
so, he knew the way to the parsonage.

Miss Le Smyrger--good, dear, honest, hearty Miss Le Smyrger, was in a
fever of anxiety on behalf of her friend. It was not that she wished her
nephew to marry Patience,--or rather that she had entertained any such
wish when he first came among them. She was not given to match-making,
and moreover thought, or had thought within herself, that they of Oxney
Colne could do very well without any admixture from Eaton Square. Her
plan of life had been that when old Mr. Woolsworthy was taken away from
Dartmoor, Patience should live with her, and that when she also shuffled
off her coil, then Patience Woolsworthy should be the maiden-mistress
of Oxney Colne--of Oxney Colne and of Mr. Cloysey's farm--to the utter
detriment of all the Broughtons. Such had been her plan before nephew
John had come among them--a plan not to be spoken of till the coming of
that dark day which should make Patience an orphan. But now her nephew
had been there, and all was to be altered. Miss Le Smyrger's plan would
have provided a companion for her old age; but that had not been her
chief object. She had thought more of Patience than of herself, and now
it seemed that a prospect of a higher happiness was opening for her
friend.

'John,' she said, as soon as the first greetings were over, 'do you
remember the last words that I said to you before you went away?' Now,
for myself, I much admire Miss Le Smyrger's heartiness, but I do not
think much of her discretion. It would have been better, perhaps, had
she allowed things to take their course.

'I can't say that I do,' said the Captain. At the same time the Captain
did remember very well what those last words had been.

'I am so glad to see you, so delighted to see you, if--if--if--,' and
then she paused, for with all her courage she hardly dared to ask her
nephew whether he had come there with the express purport of asking Miss
Woolsworthy to marry him.

To tell the truth--for there