ry
passion, till at last she put down the tea-pot, and rushed into the
garden. There as she came round the first thing she saw was the
daffodil, the beautiful daffodil Amaryllis had discovered. Beside
herself with indignation--what was the use of flowers or potatoes?--Mrs.
Iden stepped on the border and trampled the flower under foot till it
was shapeless. After this she rushed indoors again and upstairs to her
bedroom, where she locked herself in, and fumbled about in the old black
oak chest of drawers till she found a faded lavender glove.

That glove had been worn at the old "Ship" at Brighton years and years
ago in the honeymoon trip: in those days bridal parties went down by
coach. Faded with years, it had also faded from the tears that had
fallen upon it. She turned it over in her hands, and her tears spotted
it once more.

Amaryllis went on with the tea-making; for her mother to rush away in
that manner was nothing new. She toasted her father a piece of toast--he
affected to despise toast, but he always ate it if it was there, and
looked about for it if it was not, though he never said anything. The
clock struck five, and out she went to tell him tea was ready. Coming
round the house she found her daffodil crushed to pieces.

"Oh!" The blood rushed to her forehead; then her beautiful lips pouted
and quivered; tears filled her eyes, and her breast panted. She knew
immediately who had done it; she ran to her bedroom to cry and to hide
her grief and indignation.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER VI.

LADY-DAY Fair came round by and by, and Amaryllis, about eleven o'clock
in the morning, went down the garden to the end of the orchard, where
she could overlook the highway without being seen, and watch the folk go
past. Just there the road began to descend into a hollow, while the
garden continued level, so that Amaryllis, leaning her arm on the top of
the wall, was much higher up than those who went along. The wall dropped
quite fourteen feet down to the road, a rare red brick wall--thick and
closely-built, the bricks close together with thin seams of mortar, so
that the fibres of the whole mass were worked and compressed and bound
firm, like the fibres of a piece of iron. The deep red bricks had a
colour--a certain richness of stability--and at the top this good piece
of workmanship was protected from the weather by a kind of cap, and
ornamented with a projecting ridge. Within the wall A