old fellow--I'll see she gets it."

"Ey, thoo'll manish that, I's warn," said Peter, in a caustic voice.

"Come, don't you know that what belongs to the wife belongs to the
husband?"

"Don't know as I do. I'se never been larn't sec daftness," said Peter.

"Hand it over. Come, be quick!"

"Get ower me 'at can," said Peter, with a decisive twinkle.

"Gi'e him a slab ower the lug," shouted the miller from the road.

"You hear what they say? Come, out with it."

"Eh, you've rowth o' friends, you're a teeran crew, but I cares laal for
any on you."

Drayton turned away with a contemptuous snort.

"Damme, what a clatter!" he shouted, and leaped on to the raised mound
of a grave to look in at an open window. As he did so he kicked a glass
for flowers that lay upon it, and the broken frame tumbled in many
pieces. "I've done for somebody's money," he said with a loud guffaw.

"What, man, but it were thy awn brass as bought it," said the
blacksmith.

"Ey, it's thy fadder's grave," said Job Sheepshanks.

Drayton glanced down at the headstone.

"Why, so it is!" he said; "d'ye see, I hain't been here since the day I
buried him."

"Nay, that's all stuff and nonsense," said Job. "I mind the morning I
found ye lying wet and frostit on the top of that grave."

"D'ye say so? Well, I ain't for denying it; and now I think of it, I
was--yes, I was here that morning."

"Nay, you warn't nowt o' the sort," said the blacksmith. "That were the
varra morning as Giles Raisley saw you at the Pack Horse sleeping. I
mind the fratch Job had with laal Gubblum about it long ago."

"It's all stuff and nonsense," replied Job. "He were here."

"The Pack Horse? Well, now, I remember, I was there, too."

The singing had ceased, and Greta came out into the porch on tiptoe,
carrying in her arms a tiny mite, who was crying. Peter handed her the
telegram, and turned up the path.

Drayton had rejoined his companions, and was in the act of knocking the
neck off a bottle by striking it against the wall, when Peter walked
through the lych-gate.

"Tee a pint o' yal down the Methodee's back," shouted Dick, the miller,
and in another moment Brother Peter was covered with the contents of the
broken bottle.

A loud, roystering laugh filled the air, and echoed from the hills.

"What a breck!" tittered the postman.

"What a breck!" shouted the blacksmith.

"What a breck!" roared the miller.

"Get ower me 'at can!" mimicked Natt.

"He's go