_ it, here in pen and
ink. He've cut and run to take the King's shilling and be a sojer: and if
I can't overtake him before he gets to Plymouth Citadel the deed will he
done, and the Frenchies will knock him upon the head and I shall be
without a roof to cover me. Get me my shawl and bonnet."

"You baint goin' to tell me," said Susannah, "that you act'lly mean to
take and trapse to Plymouth in all this heat?"

"I do," said Barbree. "Get me my shawl and bonnet."

"What, on a Saturday afternoon! And me left single-handed to tend the
customers!"

"Drat the customers!" said Aunt Barbree. "And drat everything, includin'
the boy, if you like! But fetch to Plymouth I must and will. So, for the
third time of askin', get me my shawl and bonnet."

It cost a mort of coaxing even to persuade her to a bite of dinner before
setting forth. By half-past noon she was dressed and ready, and took the
road toward Saltash Ferry. Nandy didn't see her start. He was lying
stretched, just then, under the cliff by the foreshore, getting rid of the
effects of his pipe of tobacco.

It left him so exhausted that, when the worst was over, he rolled on his
stomach on the warm stones of the foreshore and fell into a doze; by
consequence of which he knew nothing more till the tide crept up and
wetted his ankles; and with that he heard voices--uproarious voices on the
water--and sat up to see a boatload of people pass by him and draw to the
landing-stage under Merry-Garden.

Nandy rubbed his eyes, studied the visitors--that is, as well as he could
at fifty yards' distance--and chuckled. He knew that his aunt was a
respectable woman, and particular about the folks she admitted to her
gardens. But it was too late to interfere--even if he'd wanted to
interfere, which he didn't. So he watched the visitors draw to land and
disembark; and sat and waited, still chuckling.

IV.

Susannah, having fitted forth Aunt Barbree and watched her from the gate
as she took the road to Saltash, had returned to the house in an
unpleasant temper. She was a good servant and would stand any amount of
ordering about, but she hated responsibility. To be left alone on a
Saturday afternoon in the height of the mazzard season to cope with
Heaven-knew-how-many-customers--to lay the tables in the arbours, boil the
water, take orders and, worst of all, give change (Susannah had never
learnt arithmetic)--was an outlook that fairly daunted her spirit.
Her t