rcomb sulking and brow-beating his
mother because I smiled at you this afternoon. And I did it only to
plague him!"

"Molly's a good girl," said Reuben, rather as if he expected the
assertion to be disputed, "but she was taught to despise folks when she
was a baby--wasn't you, pretty?"

"Not you--never you, grandfather."

The intimate nature of the conversation grated upon Gay not a little.
There was something splendidly barbaric about the girl, and yet the
mixture of her childishness and her cynicism affected him unpleasantly
rather than otherwise. His ideal woman--the woman of the early Victorian
period--was submissive and clinging. He was perfectly assured that
she would have borne her wrongs, and even her mother's wrongs, with
humility. Meekness had always seemed to him the becoming mental and
facial expression for the sex; and that a woman should resent appeared
almost as indelicate as that she should propose.

When supper was over, and Reuben had settled to his pipe, with the old
hound at his feet, Molly took down a bunch of keys from a nail in the
wall, and lit a lantern with a taper which she selected from a china
vase on the mantelpiece. Once outside she walked a little ahead of Gay
and the yellow blaze of the lantern flitted like a luminous bird over
the flagged walk bordered by gooseberry bushes. Between the stones,
which were hollowed by the tread of generations, nature had embroidered
the bare places with delicate patterns of moss.

At the kitchen the girl stopped to summon Patsey, the maid, who was
discovered roasting an apple at the end of a long string before the
logs.

"I am going to the big house. Come and make up the bed in the blue
room," Gay heard through the door.

"Yes'm, Miss Molly, I'se a-comin' in jes a minute."

"And bring plenty of lightwood. He will probably want a fire."

With this she appeared again on the outside, crossed the paved square to
the house, and selecting a large key, unlocked the door, which grated on
its hinges as Gay pushed it open. Following her into the hall, he stood
back while she lit a row of tallow candles, in old silver sconces, which
extended up the broad mahogany staircase to the upper landing. One by
one as she applied the taper, the candles flashed out in a misty circle,
and then rising in a clear flame, shone on her upraised hand and on the
brilliant red of her lips and cheeks.

"That is your mother's room," she said, pointing to a closed door, "and