've never done big jobs, Sim Soames an' me. P'raps
we're not up to it--but it'd be a fortune to us."

She was looking down at one of her papers and making pencil marks on it.

"You did some work last year on a little house at Tidhurst, didn't you?"
she said.

To think of her knowing that! Yes, the unaccountable good luck had
actually come to him that two Tidhurst carpenters, falling ill of the
same typhoid at the same time, through living side by side in the same
order of unsanitary cottage, he and Sim had been given their work to
finish, and had done their best.

"Yes, miss," he answered.

"I heard that when I was inquiring about you. I drove over to Tidhurst
to see the work, and it was very sound and well done. If you did that, I
can at least trust you to do something at the Court which will prove to
me what you are equal to. I want a Stornham man to undertake this."

"No Tidhurst man," said Joe Buttle, with sudden courage, "nor yet no
Barnhurst, nor yet no Yangford, nor Wratcham shall do it, if I can look
it in the face. It's Stornham work and Stornham had ought to have it. It
gives me a brace-up to hear of it."

The tall young lady laughed beautifully and got up.

"Come to the Court to-morrow morning at ten, and we will look it over
together," she said. "Good-morning, Buttle." And she went away.

In the taproom of The Clock, when Joe Buttle dropped in for his pot of
beer, he found Fox, the saddler, and Tread, the blacksmith, and each of
them fell upon the others with something of the same story to tell. The
new young lady from the Court had been to see them, too, and had brought
to each her definite little note-book. Harness was to be repaired and
furbished up, the big carriage and the old phaeton were to be put in
order, and Master Ughtred's cart was to be given new paint and springs.

"This is what she said," Fox's story ran, "and she said it so
straightforward and business-like that the conceitedest man that lived
couldn't be upset by it. 'I want to see what you can do,' she says. 'I
am new to the place and I must find out what everyone can do, then I
shall know what to do myself.' The way she sets them eyes on a man is a
sight. It's the sense in them and the human nature that takes you."

"Yes, it's the sense," said Tread, "and her looking at you as if she
expected you to have sense yourself, and understand that she's doing
fair business. It's clear-headed like--her asking questions and finding
out w