rimson. For the first time in her life she had not a
word to say for herself. Peter looked at her and then at the table, with
its fruit and flowers.

"Thank you," he said politely.

Nancy recovered herself. With a shame-faced laugh, she held out her
hand.

"Don't have me arrested for trespass, Peter. I came and looked in at
your kitchen out of impertinent curiosity, and just for fun I thought
I'd come in and get your tea. I thought you'd be so surprised--and I
meant to go before you came home, of course."

"I wouldn't have been surprised," said Peter, shaking hands. "I saw you
go past the field and I tied the horses and followed you down through
the woods. I've been sitting on the fence back yonder, watching your
comings and goings." "Why didn't you come and speak to me at church
yesterday, Peter?" demanded Nancy boldly.

"I was afraid I would say something ungrammatical," answered Peter
drily.

The crimson flamed over Nancy's face again. She pulled her hand away.

"That's cruel of you, Peter."

Peter suddenly laughed. There was a note of boyishness in the laughter.

"So it is," he said, "but I had to get rid of the accumulated malice and
spite of twenty years somehow. It's all gone now, and I'll be as amiable
as I know how. But since you have gone to the trouble of getting
my supper for me, Nancy, you must stay and help me eat it. Them
strawberries look good. I haven't had any this summer--been too busy to
pick them."

Nancy stayed. She sat at the head of Peter's table and poured his tea
for him. She talked to him wittily of the Avonlea people and the changes
in their old set. Peter followed her lead with an apparent absence of
self-consciousness, eating his supper like a man whose heart and mind
were alike on good terms with him. Nancy felt wretched--and, at the
same time, ridiculously happy. It seemed the most grotesque thing in the
world that she should be presiding there at Peter's table, and yet
the most natural. There were moments when she felt like crying--other
moments when her laughter was as ready and spontaneous as a girl's.
Sentiment and humour had always waged an equal contest in Nancy's
nature.

When Peter had finished his strawberries he folded his arms on the table
and looked admiringly at Nancy.

"You look well at the head of a table, Nancy," he said critically. "How
is it that you haven't been presiding at one of your own long before
this? I thought you'd meet a lots of men out in the