she
had chosen to go off alone.

"I think, mother," I said--hypocritically, I own it--"that Elsie was
feared that you would be for offering something for her work."

"And, indeed," said my mother, "what for not? I had as muckle in my
mind. Who deserves it better, after all that she has done for me?"

This was a better spirit, but it was necessary that I should hold
mother's manifestation of affection well in leash also, or she was
quite capable of putting on her bonnet and going off to the Bridge
End--where she would have heard another story from Elsie.

"Elsie's young and shy, mother," I said, to put her off; "but she has a
real affection for you. And if she thought you expected her to take
siller for her work here--it would hurt her sore. She did it for love."

"I doubt it not," said Mistress Caleb, a little dry like--what we call
"cut" in our part of the country--"and so will Meysie Caw's bairns do
the like. They will do all that Elsie Stennis did, and as ye say, Mr.
Joseph, all for love--whilk is a silly word to use. They are brave
workers, both of them; and it will be more fitting to have two young
lassies in a house than one."

"And what for that?" I said, bristling up at once.

"Oh," said Mrs. Caleb, "they will be able to do more work!"

I knew very well that this was not what she meant, but I was obliged to
be content; for Susan Fergusson of the Common Farm was far more subtle
in her talk than any laddie of eighteen.

"And now," she went on, "I will be takin' my road. Master Joe here
will convoy me a bit. The twa lassies will be over early i' the
morning. You can tell that great lazy nowt, Bob Kingsman, to come for
their bits o' traps wi' a cairt in the afternoon."

I walked with her out of the town, and all the way Susan Fergusson
entertained me with an account of the many good qualities of Meysie's
bairns. And I could see very well that, once installed, she did not
mean that they should quit our big and comfortable house in a hurry.
And the thought of Elsie nearly drove me out of my mind, to think what
she would say and do when she heard of it.

Not that I could say I disliked the girls in any way--at least, not
Harriet Caw. No man can really in his heart dislike a girl like
Harriet.

And that was the most dangerous symptom of all--just what the Hayfork
Parson would have called the natural, double-dealing, deceitful heart
of man.

CHAPTER XXI

A JACKDAW'S TAIL FEATHER

One