of my own
body to go walking lonely on Saturdays when we had so often loitered in
company, thinking that the good days would never cease, wanting nothing
better, nothing other than just what we had. Ah! I had a prevision
that day that Elsie and I had better make the most of our time during
this summer. For the winter would try our friendship.

What I did not foresee was how suddenly Elsie would grow up. Yet she
had always done things suddenly--from boxing my ears to deciding to
continue her studies at home. She did the latter that very day, and in
the evening she announced to Nance that she was not going back to
school.

"Very well," said Nance, not in the least surprised. Indeed, with her
own limited education, she had often wondered why Elsie had prolonged
hers so unnecessarily.

It was pleasant in Nance's cottage by the Bridge End of Breckonside.
The house was, as perhaps I have already explained, overwhelmed in a
perfect show of creeping flowers, not all of them yet in their full
bloom of colour, but always spreading up to the chimneys and throwing
abroad reckless tendrils that brushed the face as one entered the
little wooden porch.

Nance was busy with the supper dishes, and Elsie had come down after
"giving her hair a tidy," as she had been commanded by Nance to do.

"Who do you think has been here the day?" said Nance suddenly.

And I knew in a minute, but Elsie guessed her grandfather.

"The young English minister from Over Breckonton."

"Yes," Nance went on to give details, finding that nobody exclaimed at
her news; "as fine an Englisher as ever was, with a bit cambric
handkerchief that wad hae been little use to a man wi' a cauld in his
heid, and a black cane wi' real silver bands. Extraordinary civil he
was, and bode near an hour talkin' to puir auld Nance, and speirin'
where ye were, Elsie, and what time ye wad be hame!"

I looked at Elsie. She was busily engaged in tying up some sprays of
early heath, which we had gathered on the steep sides of Brom Beacon.
She did not seem to be listening. But she heard well enough, as her
words proved.

"Oh, yes, Mr. Ralph Ablethorpe! Joe and I met him by chance on the way
to my grandfather's the other day."

Now the vixen knew very well that there would be no more question of
the "coming of the Englishy minister" after an announcement like that.
Nance was all agog to hear of the wonders of Deep Moat Grange, which
she had never seen except from t