love
running water. Good stones could be got there, water rats might be
chased, there were strawberries on the banks which he gathered and
threaded on stalks of grass for his sisters, Patience and Jerusha. They
used to come with him and have pleasant games, but it was a long time
since Patience had been able to come out, for in the winter, a grievous
trouble had come on the family. The good mother had died, leaving a
little baby of six weeks old, and Patience, who was only thirteen, had
to attend to everything at home, and take care of poor little sickly
Benoni with no one to help her but her little seven years old sister.

The children's lives had been much less bright since that sad day; and
Steadfast seldom had much time for play. He knew he must get home as
fast as he could to help Patience in milking the cows, feeding the pigs
and poultry, and getting the supper, or some of the other things that
his elder brother Jephthah called wench-work and would not do.

He could not, however, help looking up at the hole in the side of the
steep cliff, where one might climb up to such a delightful cave, in
which he and Patience had so often played on hot days. It had been their
secret, and a kind of palace to them. They had sat there as king and
queen, had paved it with stones from the brook, and had had many plans
for the sports they would have there this summer, little thinking that
Patience would have been turned into a grave, busy little housewife,
instead of a merry, playful child.

Toby looked up too, and began to bark. There was a rustling in the
bushes below the cave, and Steadfast, at first in dismay to see his
secret delight invaded, beheld between the mountain ash boughs and ivy,
to his great surprise, a square cap and black cassock tucked up, and
then a bit of brown leathern coat, which he knew full well. It was the
Vicar, Master Holworth, and his father John Kenton was Churchwarden,
so it was no wonder to see him and the Parson together, but what could
bring them here--into Steadfast's cave? and with a dark lantern too!
They seemed as surprised, perhaps as vexed as he was, at the sight of
him, but his father said, "'Tis my lad, Steadfast, I'll answer for him."

"And so will I," returned the clergyman. "Is anyone with you, my boy?"

"No, your reverence, no one save the beasts."

"Then come up here," said his father. "Someone has been playing here, I
see."

"Patience and I, father, last summer."

"No one els