t
this very afternoon."

"Lady Tintern!" cried Peter, in dismay. "Then you won't be able to
come to Barracombe this evening?"

"I am not in the habit of throwing over a dinner engagement," said
Sarah, with dignity. "But in case they won't let me come," she added,
with great inconsistency, "I'll put a lighted candle in the top window
of the tower, as usual. But you can guess how many more of these
enjoyable expeditions we shall be allowed to make. Not that we need
regret them if they are all to be as lively as this one. Still--"

She helped herself to a jam-puff, and offered the dish to Peter, with
an engaging smile. He helped himself absently.

"I don't deny I am fond of taking meals in the open air, and more
especially on the top of the moor," said Sarah, with a sigh of
content.

"What has she come for?" said Peter.

"I shall be better able to tell you when I have seen her."

"Don't you know?"

"I can pretty well guess. She's going to forgive me, for one thing.
Then she'll tell me that I don't deserve my good luck, but that Lord
Avonwick is so patient and so long-suffering, that he's accepted her
assurance that I don't know my own mind (and I'm not sure I do), and
he's going to give me one more chance to become Lady Avonwick, though
I was so foolish as to say 'No' to his last offer."

"You didn't say 'No' to _my_ last offer!" cried Peter.

"I don't believe an offer of marriage is even legal before you're
one-and-twenty," said Miss Sarah, derisively. "What did it matter what
I said? Haven't I told you I was only playing?"

"You may tell me so a thousand times," said Peter, doggedly, "but I
shall never believe you until I see you actually married to somebody
else."

CHAPTER XX

Lady Tintern was pleased to leave Paddington by a much earlier
train than could have been expected. She hired a fly, and a pair of
broken-kneed horses, at Brawnton, and once more took her relations
at Hewelscourt by surprise. On this occasion, however, she was not
fortunate enough to find her invalid niece at play in the stable-yard,
though she detected her at luncheon, and warmly congratulated her upon
her robust appearance and her excellent appetite.

Her journey had, no doubt, been undertaken with the very intentions
Sarah had described; but another motive also prompted her, which Sarah
had not divined.

Much as she desired to marry her grand-niece to Lord Avonwick, she
was not blind to the young man's personal di