pleased
that I should have turned her neck and crop off the premises. It
was high time. She had mastered the old man, and could make him
do what she pleased."

"Whom have you got in her place?"

"Julia Caesar. She was sent away from the Colpuses for drawing the
beer too freely. Well, here she can draw it whenever there are men
who ask for drink, so she will be in her proper element. But she
is only a stop gap. I engaged her because there really was for the
moment no one else available, but she goes as soon as we can find
a better."

"Will you take me?" asked Mehetabel, with a smile, and with some
confidence that she would be gladly accepted.

"We shall see--there is another place for you, Matabel," said Iver.
"Now let us talk of something else. Was it not a piece of rare good
luck that I was stuck on the jury? Do you know, I believe all would
have gone wrong but for me. I put my foot down and said, 'Not
guilty,' and would not budge. The rest were almost all inclined to
give against you, Matabel, but there was a fellow with a wist in
his stupid noddle against capital punishment. He was just as
resolute as I was, and between us, we worked the rest round to
our way of thinking. But I should like to know the truth about it
all, for it is marvellous to me."

"There is nothing for me to say, Iver," answered Matabel, "but
that some words I uttered made Jonas spring back, and neither
he nor I knew that there was a kiln behind, it was so overgrown
with brambles, and he fell down that."

"And you laughed."

"Oh, Iver! I don't know what I did. I was so frightened, and my
head was so much in a whirl that I remember nothing more. You do
not really think that I laughed."

"They all said you did."

"Iver, you know me too well to believe that I was other than
frightened out of my wits. There are times when a laugh comes
because the tears will not break out--it is a gasp of pain, of
horror, nothing more. I remember, at my confirmation, when the
Bishop laid his hands on us, that the girl beside me laughed; but
it was only that she was feeling more than she could give token
of any other way."

"That's like enough," said Iver, and taking the poker he put the
turf together to make it blaze; "I say, Matabel, they tell me that
Jonas was a bad loser by the smash of the Wealden Bank, and that
he was about to mortgage his little place. Of course, that is
yours now--or belongs to the young shaver. There are a hundred
pounds my m