rgaret smiled for the first time this many days. "Luke loves dried
puddings dearly," said she, "and I make them to his mind, 'Tis them he
comes a-courting here." Then she suddenly turned red. "But if I thought
he came after your son's wife that is, or ought to be, I'd soon put him
to the door."

"Nay, nay; for Heaven's sake let me not make mischief. Poor lad! Why,
girl, Fancy will not be bridled, Bless you, I wormed it out of him near
a twelvemonth agone."

"Oh, mother, and you let him?"

"Well, I thought of you. I said to myself, 'If he is fool enough to
be her slave for nothing, all the better for her. A lone woman is lost
without a man about her to fetch and carry her little matters,' But now
my mind is changed, and I think the best use you can put him to is to
marry him."

"So then, his own mother is against him, and would wed me to the first
comer. An, Gerard, thou hast but me; I will not believe thee dead till
I see thy tomb, nor false till I see thee with another lover in thine
hand. Foolish boy, I shall ne'er be civil to him again."

Afflicted with the busybody's protection, Luke Peterson met a cold
reception in the house where he had hitherto found a gentle and kind
one. And by-and-by, finding himself very little spoken to at all, and
then sharply and irritably, the great soft fellow fell to whimpering,
and asked Margaret plump if he had done anything to offend her.

"Nothing. I am to blame. I am curst. If you will take my counsel you
will keep out of my way awhile."

"It is all along of me, Luke," said the busybody.

"You, Mistress Catherine, Why, what have I done for you to set her
against me?"

"Nay, I meant all for the best. I told her I saw you were looking
towards her through a wedding ring, But she won't hear of it."

"There was no need to tell her that, wife; she knows I am courting her
this twelvemonth."

"Not I," said Margaret; "or I should never have opened the street door
to you.

"Why, I come here every Saturday night. And that is how the lads in
Rotterdam do court. If we sup with a lass o' Saturdays, that wooing."

"Oh, that is Rotterdam, is it? Then next time you come, let it be
Thursday or Friday. For my part, I thought you came after my puddings,
boy."

"I like your puddings well enough. You make them better than mother
does, But I like you still better than the puddings," said Luke
tenderly.

"Then you have seen the last of them. How dare you talk so to another
man's wife,