for him; and
there would be no farmers' banquet or speeches or cigar-smoking.

When he came in to dinner he found Mavis all hot and red, but pleased
with herself after her bustling activities. The whole business was
settled. Norah was to go as a paying guest to that place at
Bournemouth, and Mavis would drive her over to Rodchurch Road and put
her into the four-fifteen train. At the station they would meet a girl
called Nellie Evans, whom by a happy chance Mrs. Norton was
despatching to-day; and so the two girls could travel together, and
prevent each other from being a fool when they changed trains at the
junction; and altogether nothing could have turned out better or
nicer.

Mavis, babbling contentedly all through dinner, harped on the niceness
both of people and things. Mrs. Norton, and indeed everybody else, had
been so nice about it. All Rodchurch had seemed anxious to assist Mr.
and Mrs. Dale in contriving their little maid's holiday. "And it is
nice," said Mavis simply, "to be treated like that." Mrs. Norton had
taken her all round the vicarage garden, and she had never seen it
looking nicer. "Although the flowers aren't anything to boast of, any
more than ours are."

"And what _do_ you think? Here's a bit of news you'll be sorry to
hear, though it mayn't surprise you." Then Mavis related how it had
been necessary to procure some sort of trunk to hold Norah's things,
because there wasn't a single presentable bit of luggage in the house,
and she had discovered exactly what she wanted--something that was not
immoderate, appearing solid, yet not heavy--at the new shop that had
recently been opened at the bottom of the village near the Gauntlet
Inn. First, however, she had gone to their old friend the saddler's,
wanting to see if she could buy the box there. But Mr. Allen's shop
was empty, woe-begone, dirty with cobwebs, dead flies, and mud on the
window; and Mr. Allen himself was ill in bed, being nursed hand and
foot, and fed like a baby, by poor Mrs. Allen. He had been stricken
down by some dreadful form of rheumatism, and three doctors had said
the same thing--that he had brought this calamity upon himself by his
ridiculous, ceaseless tramping after the hounds.

Dale nodded and smiled, or made his face appropriately grave, while
Mavis prattled to him; but truly his mind was occupied only by Norah.
She came in and out of the room, looking pale and limp and resigned;
she knew all about the trunk, and that it