rtainly rain. I thought it was
very queer. Well, it is too late to do anything now. We must just wait
and see what happens."

And behold the morrow had come, the clouds were gone, and it was a day
in a thousand, a very queen of days.

The party started for Ashendale, some riding, some driving, waking the
quiet green lanes with a happy tumult of wheels and horse-hoofs and
laughing voices. Captain Fothergill contrived to be near Miss Langton,
and to talk in a fashion which made her look down once or twice when she
had encountered the eagerness of his dark eyes. The words he said might
have been published by the town-crier. But that functionary could not
have reproduced the tone and manner which rendered them significant,
though Sissy hardly knew the precise amount of meaning they were
intended to convey. She was glad when the tower of the priory rose above
the trees. So was Walter Latimer, who had been eying the back of
Fothergill's head or the sharply-cut profile which was turned so
frequently toward Miss Langton, and who was firmly persuaded that the
captain ought to be shot.

Ashendale Priory was built nearly at the bottom of a hill. Part of it,
close by the gateway, was a farmhouse occupied by a tenant of the
Latimers. His wife, a pleasant middle-aged woman, came out to meet them
as they dismounted, and a rosy daughter of sixteen or seventeen lingered
shyly in the little garden, which was full to overflowing of
old-fashioned flowers and humming with multitudes of bees. The hot sweet
fragrance of the crowded borders made Sissy say that it was like the
very heart of summer-time.

"A place to recollect and dream of on a November day," said Fothergill.

"Oh, don't talk of November now! I hate it."

"I don't want November, I assure you," he replied. "Why cannot this last
for ever?"

"The weather?"

"Much more than the weather. Do you suppose I should only remember that
it was a fine day?"

"What, the place too?" said Sissy. "It is beautiful, but I think you
would soon get tired of Ashendale, Captain Fothergill."

"Do you?" he said in a low voice, looking at her with the eyes which
seemed to draw hers to meet them. "Try me and see which will be tired
first." And, without giving her time to answer, he went on: "Couldn't
you be content with Ashendale?"

"For always? I don't think I could--not for all my life."

"Well, then, the perfect place is yet to find," said Fothergill. "And
how charming it must be!"

"