I hope?' asked Charley.

'Yes,' replied Sylvia, and then she wished she could originate some
remark; he would think her so stupid if she just kept on saying such
little short bits of speeches, and if he thought her stupid he might
perhaps go away again to his former place.

But he was quite far enough gone in love of her beauty, and pretty
modest ways, not to care much whether she talked or no, so long as
she showed herself so pleasingly conscious of his close
neighbourhood.

'I must come and see the old gentleman; and your mother, too,' he
added more slowly, for he remembered that his visits last year had
not been quite so much welcomed by Bell Robson as by her husband;
perhaps it was because of the amount of drink which he and Daniel
managed to get through of an evening. He resolved this year to be
more careful to please the mother of Sylvia.

When tea was ended there was a great bustle and shifting of places,
while Mrs. Corney and her daughters carried out trays full of used
cups, and great platters of uneaten bread and butter into the
back-kitchen, to be washed up after the guests were gone. Just
because she was so conscious that she did not want to move, and
break up the little conversation between herself and Kinraid, Sylvia
forced herself to be as active in the service going on as became a
friend of the house; and she was too much her mother's own daughter
to feel comfortable at leaving all the things in the disorder which
to the Corney girls was second nature.

'This milk mun go back to t' dairy, I reckon,' said she, loading
herself with milk and cream.

'Niver fash thysel' about it,' said Nelly Corney, 'Christmas comes
but onest a year, if it does go sour; and mother said she'd have a
game at forfeits first thing after tea to loosen folks's tongues,
and mix up t' lads and lasses, so come along.'

But Sylvia steered her careful way to the cold chill of the dairy,
and would not be satisfied till she had carried away all the unused
provision into some fresher air than that heated by the fires and
ovens used for the long day's cooking of pies and cakes and much
roast meat.

When they came back a round of red-faced 'lads,' as young men up to
five-and-thirty are called in Lancashire and Yorkshire if they are
not married before, and lasses, whose age was not to be defined,
were playing at some country game, in which the women were
apparently more interested than the men, who looked shamefaced, and
afraid o