itself looked softly blue instead of
gloomy purple-black or awful dreary gray.

"Aye," said Martha with a cheerful grin. "Th' storm's over for a bit. It
does like this at this time o' th' year. It goes off in a night like it
was pretendin' it had never been here an' never meant to come again.
That's because th' springtime's on its way. It's a long way off yet, but
it's comin'."

"I thought perhaps it always rained or looked dark in England," Mary
said.

"Eh! no!" said Martha, sitting up on her heels among her black lead
brushes. "Nowt o' th' soart!"

"What does that mean?" asked Mary seriously. In India the natives spoke
different dialects which only a few people understood, so she was not
surprised when Martha used words she did not know.

Martha laughed as she had done the first morning.

"There now," she said. "I've talked broad Yorkshire again like Mrs. Medlock
said I mustn't. 'Nowt o' th' soart' means 'nothin'-of-the-sort,'" slowly
and carefully, "but it takes so long to say it. Yorkshire's th' sunniest
place on earth when it is sunny. I told thee tha'd like th' moor after a
bit. Just you wait till you see th' gold-colored gorse blossoms an' th'
blossoms o' th' broom, an' th' heather flowerin', all purple bells, an'
hundreds o' butterflies flutterin' an' bees hummin' an' skylarks soarin'
up an' singin'. You'll want to get out on it at sunrise an' live out on
it all day like Dickon does."

"Could I ever get there?" asked Mary wistfully, looking through her
window at the far-off blue. It was so new and big and wonderful and such
a heavenly color.

"I don't know," answered Martha. "Tha's never used tha' legs since tha'
was born, it seems to me. Tha' couldn't walk five mile. It's five mile
to our cottage."

"I should like to see your cottage."

Martha stared at her a moment curiously before she took up her polishing
brush and began to rub the grate again. She was thinking that the small
plain face did not look quite as sour at this moment as it had done the
first morning she saw it. It looked just a trifle like little Susan
Ann's when she wanted something very much.

"I'll ask my mother about it," she said. "She's one o' them that nearly
always sees a way to do things. It's my day out to-day an' I'm goin'
home. Eh! I am glad. Mrs. Medlock thinks a lot o' mother. Perhaps she
could talk to her."

"I like your mother," said Mary.

"I should think tha' did," agreed Martha, polishing away.

"I've never s