the convoy of horses had passed, and then make a ring by
candlelight, and the other boys would like it. But suddenly there came
round the post where the letters of our founder are, not from the way
of Taunton but from the side of Lowman bridge, a very small string of
horses, only two indeed (counting for one the pony), and a red-faced man
on the bigger nag.

"Plaise ye, worshipful masters," he said, being feared of the gateway,
"carn 'e tull whur our Jan Ridd be?"

"Hyur a be, ees fai, Jan Ridd," answered a sharp little chap, making
game of John Fry's language.

"Zhow un up, then," says John Fry poking his whip through the bars at
us; "Zhow un up, and putt un aowt."

The other little chaps pointed at me, and some began to hallo; but I
knew what I was about.

"Oh, John, John," I cried, "what's the use of your coming now, and Peggy
over the moors, too, and it so cruel cold for her? The holidays don't
begin till Wednesday fortnight, John. To think of your not knowing
that!"

John Fry leaned forward in the saddle, and turned his eyes away from
me; and then there was a noise in his throat like a snail crawling on a
window-pane.

"Oh, us knaws that wull enough, Maister Jan; reckon every Oare-man knaw
that, without go to skoo-ull, like you doth. Your moother have kept arl
the apples up, and old Betty toorned the black puddens, and none dare
set trap for a blagbird. Arl for thee, lad; every bit of it now for
thee!"

He checked himself suddenly, and frightened me. I knew that John Fry's
way so well.

"And father, and father--oh, how is father?" I pushed the boys right and
left as I said it. "John, is father up in town! He always used to come
for me, and leave nobody else to do it."

"Vayther'll be at the crooked post, tother zide o' telling-house.* Her
coodn't lave 'ouze by raison of the Chirstmas bakkon comin' on, and zome
o' the cider welted."

* The "telling-houses" on the moor are rude cots where the
shepherds meet to "tell" their sheep at the end of the
pasturing season.

He looked at the nag's ears as he said it; and, being up to John Fry's
ways, I knew that it was a lie. And my heart fell like a lump of lead,
and I leaned back on the stay of the gate, and longed no more to fight
anybody. A sort of dull power hung over me, like the cloud of a brooding
tempest, and I feared to be told anything. I did not even care to stroke
the nose of my pony Peggy, although she pushed it in through the ra