d, held him still, though he
was no longer their servant.

Miss Henderson moved back towards the house.

"And you'll hurry these men up?--as much as you can? They _are_
slow-coaches! I must get in the week after next. Miss Leighton and I
intend to come, whatever happens."

Hastings understood that "Miss Leighton" was to be Miss Henderson's
partner in the farm, specially to look after the dairy work. Miss
Henderson seemed to think a lot of her.

"And you must please engage those two men you spoke of. Neither of them,
you say, under sixty! Well, there's no picking and choosing now. If they
were eighty I should have to take them! till the harvest's got in. There
are two girls coming from the Land Army, and you've clinched that other
girl from the village?"

Hastings nodded.

"Well, I dare say we shall get the harvest in somehow," she said,
standing at the gate, and looking over the fields. "Miss Leighton and I
mean to put our backs into it. But Miss Leighton isn't as strong as I
am."

Her eyes wandered thoughtfully over the wheat-field, ablaze under the
level gold of the sun. Then she suddenly smiled.

"I expect you think it a queer business, Mr. Hastings, women taking to
farming?"

"Well, it's new, you see, Miss Henderson."

"I believe it's going to be very common. Why shouldn't the women do it!"
She frowned a little.

"Oh, no reason at all," said Hastings hurriedly, thinking he had offended
her. "I've nothing against it myself. And there won't be men enough to go
round, after the war."

She looked at him sharply.

"You've got a son in the war?"

"Two, and one's been killed."

"Last year?"

"No, last month."

Miss Henderson said nothing, but her look was full of softness. "He was
to have been allowed home directly," Hastings went on, "for two or three
months. He was head woodman before the war on Lord Radley's property." He
pointed to the wooded slopes of the hill. "And they were to have given
him leave to see to the cutting of these woods."

"These woods!" Miss Henderson turned a startled face upon him. "You don't
mean to say they're coming down!"

"Half of them commandeered," said Hastings, with a shrug. "The Government
valuers have been all over them these last weeks. They're splendid
timber, you know. There's been a timber camp the other side of the hills
a long while. They've got Canadians, and no doubt they'll move on here."

Miss Henderson made another quick movement. She said nothing, h