th the exception of the struggling Puck, who did not like
leaving _terra firma_, and was more of a hindrance than an aid, he
pushed out into the pond, making for the islet in the centre by means of
a long pole which he had thinned off from a piece of fencing, sticking
it into the mud at the bottom and pushing against it with all his might.
Meanwhile, the frail structure on which he sat trembled and wobbled
about in the most unseaworthy fashion, causing him almost to repent of
his undertaking almost as soon as he had started, although he had the
incense of popular admiration to egg him on, for the village boys were
cheering and hooraying him like--"like anything," as he would himself
have said!

CHAPTER SEVEN.

FATHER AND SON.

The road from the vicarage to the village and station beyond passed
within a hundred yards or so of the pond; but from the latter being
situated in a hollow and the meadows surrounding it inclosed within a
hedge of thick brushwood, it could only be seen by those passing to and
fro from one point--where the path began to rise above the valley as it
curved round the spur of the down.

It was Saturday also, when, as Teddy well knew, his father would be
engaged on the compilation of his Sunday sermon, and so not likely to be
going about the parish, as was his custom of an afternoon, visiting the
sick, comforting the afflicted, and warning those evil-doers who
preferred idleness and ale at the "Lamb" to honest toil and uprightness
of living; consequently the young scapegrace was almost confident of
non-interruption from any of his home folk, who, besides being too busy
indoors to think of him, were ignorant of his whereabouts. It was also
Jupp's heaviest day at the station, so _he_ couldn't come after him he
thought; and he was enjoying himself to his heart's content, when as the
Fates frequently rule it, the unexpected happened.

Miss Conny, now a tall slim girl of thirteen, but more sedate and
womanly even than she had been at ten, if that were possible, was
occupied in the parlour "mending the children's clothes," as she
expressed it in her matronly way, when she suddenly missed a large reel
of darning cotton. Wondering what had become of it, for, being neat and
orderly in her habits, her things seldom strayed from their proper
places, she began hunting about for the absent article in different
directions and turning over the piles of stockings before her.

"Have you seen it?" she asked