light; he had just given her the carnations. "I am
glad you like the old place here," he said. "It isn't as romantic, of
course, as Wayne's Court, but it is comfortable. You know Wayne? He is a
very good fellow."

"I met him in town," Elsie answered.

"Ah, yes! he knows your friends the Lennards. What a wanderer he has
been! But now, they tell me, he seems inclined to settle down at last."

"That is a good thing," said Elsie, raising the carnations to her face.

"He'll marry, I suppose," Francis Ryan went on. "The Danforths are
trying to make up the match with Mrs. Verdon. Do you know her? A fair
woman, with sky-blue eyes. She has come to The Cedars again, close to
the Court; so that looks as if she meant business."

This was the news that Elsie heard on her first day at Willow Farm. It
gave her a strong desire for solitude, and she was glad when Francis
said that he must go and look after one of the horses. She waited until
he had disappeared, and then went down a long gravelled walk, between
crowded borders, to a little white gate. Lifting the latch, she walked
across a green meadow, and found herself close to the brink of a river.
Rushbrook was a place of many waters, a land of green and silver,
beautiful with the peace that belongs to a pastoral country. She soon
found a cosy nook on an old tree-trunk in the shade, and sat down to
think. It was a good spot for a reverie. You could listen to the whisper
of the water among the sedges, and look off, across the river, to the
low-lying meadows beyond--a scene which was fascinating in its intense
quietness. It rests the eye and brain to gaze at those cool green
levels, broidered with silvery rivulets, and watch the water stealing
among rushes and tall rustling reeds.

[Illustration: "IT WAS A GOOD SPOT FOR A REVERIE."]

It was a lovely morning--soft, hazy, exquisite, as mornings in August
often are. Looking back across the meadow, Elsie saw a row of
copper-beeches standing in an even line against the deep, dreamy blue of
the sky. Away to the left was a mass of foliage hiding the red peaked
roof of Willow Farm.

She had not expected to be very happy when she came to Rushbrook. Deep
down in her heart was a fear which she kept carefully covered over; she
was ashamed of its very existence, and strove to hide it from her own
sight. It was Mrs. Verdon--always Mrs. Verdon--who was to have
everything worth having.

Of course, it was the most natural thing in the world