t
the pot boils and the children's feet are shod. Superannuated old men
and women are sure of their broth and Sunday dinner, and their dread of
the impending "Union" fades away. The squire or my lord or my lady can
be depended upon to care for their old bones until they are laid under
the sod in the green churchyard. With wealth and good will at the Great
House, life warms and offers prospects. There are Christmas feasts and
gifts and village treats, and the big carriage or the smaller ones stop
at cottage doors and at once confer exciting distinction and carry good
cheer.

But Stornham village had scarcely a remote memory of any period of such
prosperity. It had not existed even in the older Sir Nigel's time, and
certainly the present Sir Nigel's reign had been marked only by neglect,
ill-temper, indifference, and a falling into disorder and decay. Farms
were poorly worked, labourers were unemployed, there was no trade from
the manor household, no carriages, no horses, no company, no spending
of money. Cottages leaked, floors were damp, the church roof itself was
falling to pieces, and the vicar had nothing to give. The helpless and
old cottagers were carried to the "Union" and, dying there, were buried
by the stinted parish in parish coffins.

Her ladyship had not visited the cottages since her child's birth. And
now such inspiriting events as were everyday happenings in lucky places
like Westerbridge and Wratcham and Yangford, showed signs of being about
to occur in Stornham itself.

To begin with, even before the journey to London, Kedgers had made two
or three visits to The Clock, and had been in a communicative mood. He
had related the story of the morning when he had looked up from his
work and had found the strange young lady standing before him, with the
result that he had been "struck all of a heap." And then he had given a
detailed account of their walk round the place, and of the way in which
she had looked at things and asked questions, such as would have done
credit to a man "with a 'ead on 'im."

"Nay! Nay!" commented Kedgers, shaking his own head doubtfully, even
while with admiration. "I've never seen the like before--in young
women--neither in lady young women nor in them that's otherwise."

Afterwards had transpired the story of Mrs. Noakes, and the kitchen
grate, Mrs. Noakes having a friend in Miss Lupin, the village
dressmaker.

"I'd not put it past her," was Mrs. Noakes' summing up, "to orde