.

"Well?" she said sharply, and with an attempt to look fierce--which was
a perfect failure, by the way, for Martha Gusset's was one of those
countenances that never can by any possibility look angry, only a little
comic when temper had the sway.

"No, not well, Martha," said the constable plaintively; "but I don't
think I am very much hurt."

"Serve you right if you were," said the cook, "coming here like this
when master's out, and making a fuss about hidden spies, just to make
people believe what a great person you are! They don't know you like I
do. Well, what do you want?"

"The young Squire said we were all to have lunch, and I have dragged
myself here to have mine."

"Dragged? Rolled, you mean!" cried his sister. "You grow more and more
like a tub every day."

"But tubs have to be filled, Martha, dear," said the constable, with an
attempt at a smile.

"Not in my kitchen if they do," said Martha, with a snort; "and Master
Waller never meant _you_ to come in with the soldiers, so the sooner you
go off back to the cottage the pleasanter it will be for you, for if I
am put out I speak my mind, and I'm put out now so there!"

Martha whisked herself round and marched back into the kitchen, while
the constable, who seemed to have the yard to himself, sighed, and went
across to the mounting-stone by the stable door, where he seated himself
to wait, intently watching the ivy-clothed, highly pitched roof the
while, till one of the yard dogs came up cautiously and slowly, and
smelt him all round, but made no further advance towards being friends.

That lunch was rather prolonged, and, as he listened, Waller, with his
hands in his pockets, marched up and down the hall, frowning and
thinking till he recalled the breaking of the ladder and the aspect of
the village constable, when his frown faded away as if by magic, and,
throwing himself into one of the big old oak hall chairs, he rolled
about in it, laughing silently till he cried.

At last a sharp order rang out in the kitchen, and though he could not
see, Waller heard the men spring to their feet and march out into the
yard, where he followed quickly, in time to see them take their piled
muskets, while Joe Hanson, the gardener, who had been playing his part
at the lunch with greater zeal than he bestowed upon his mowing or
digging, busied himself with picking up the broken ladder, grinning
across at Tony Gusset the while.

Directly after there were a few