any one came to the front door in
the morning, and, indeed, not often in the afternoon either, and this
knock sounded sharp and important somehow. Though I was still quite a
little girl I knew it would vex grandmamma if I tried to peep out to see
who it was--it was one of the things she would have said 'no lady should
ever do'--and I could not bear her to think I ever forgot how even a
very small lady should behave.

The only thing I could do was to look out of the side window, not that I
could see the door from there, but I had a good view of the road where
it passed the short track, too rough to call a road, leading to our own
little gate.

No cart or carriage could come nearer than that point; the tradesmen
from Middlemoor always stopped there and carried up our meat or bread or
whatever it was--not very heavy basketfuls, I suspect--to the kitchen
door, and I used to be very fond of standing at this window, watching
the unpacking from the carts.

There was no cart there to-day, but what _was_ there nearly took my
breath away.

'Oh, grandmamma,' I called out, quite forgetting that by this time Kezia
must have opened the door; 'oh, grandmamma, do look at the lovely
carriage and ponies.'

Granny did not answer. She had not heard me, for she was in the
dining-room, as I might have known. But I had got into the habit of
calling to her whenever I was pleased or excited, and generally, somehow
or other, she managed to hear. And I could not leave the window, I was
so engrossed by what I saw.

There was a girl in the carriage, to me she seemed a grown-up lady. She
was sitting still, holding the reins. But I did not see the figure of
another lady which by this time had got hidden by the house, as she
followed the little groom whom she had sent on to ask if Mrs. Wingfield
was at home, meaning at first, to wait till he came back. I heard her
afterwards explaining to grandmamma that the boy was rather deaf and she
was afraid he had not heard her distinctly, so she had come herself.

And while I was still gazing at the carriage and the ponies, the
drawing-room door, already a little ajar, was pushed wide open and I
heard Kezia saying she would tell Mrs. Wingfield at once.

'Mrs. Nestor; you heard my name?' said some one in a pleasant voice.

I turned round.

There stood a tall lady in a long dark green cloak, she had a hat on,
not a bonnet, and I just thought of her as another lady, not troubling
myself as to whether