Will, viewed with outspoken approval or
secret distrust those evidences of success and failure spread about her,
and passed the abandoned attempt to reclaim land without a word or sign
that she remembered. Will crowed like a happy child; his mother poured
advice into his unheeding ears; and then a cart lumbered up with a great
surprise in it. True to her intention Mrs. Blanchard had chosen the day
of Phoebe 's arrival to send the old piano to Newtake, and now it was
triumphantly trundled into the parlour, while Will protested and
admired. It added not a little to the solid splendour of the apartment,
and Mrs. Blanchard viewed it with placid but genuine satisfaction. Its
tarnished veneer and red face looked like an old honest friend, so Will
declared, and he doubted not that his wife would rejoice as he did.

Presently the cart destined to bring Phoebe's boxes started for Chagford
under Ted Chown's direction. It was a new cart, and the owner hoped that
sight of it, with "William Blanchard, Newtake," nobly displayed on the
tail-board, would please his father-in-law.

Meantime, at Monks Barton the great day had likewise dawned, but Phoebe,
from cowardice rather than philosophy, did not mention what was to
happen until the appearance of Chown made it necessary to do so.

Mr. Blee was the first to stand bewildered before Ted's blunt
announcement that he had come for Mrs. Blanchard's luggage.

"What luggage? What the douce be talkin' 'bout?" he asked.

"Why, everything, I s'pose. She 'm comin' home to-day--that's knawn,
ban't it?"

"Gormed if 'tis! Not by me, anyways--nor Miller, neither."

Then Phoebe appeared and Billy heard the truth.

"My! An' to keep it that quiet! Theer'll be a tidy upstore when Miller
comes to hear tell--"

But Mr. Lyddon was at the door and Phoebe answered his questioning eyes.

"My birthday, dear faither. You must remember--why, you was the first to
give me joy of it! Twenty-one to-day, an' I must go--I must--'tis my
duty afore everything."

The old man's jaw fell and he looked the picture of sorrowful surprise.

"But--but to spring it like this! Why to-day? Why to-day? It's madness
and it's cruelty to fly from your home the first living moment you've
got the power. I'd counted on a merry evenin,' tu, an' axed more 'n wan
to drink your gude health."

"Many's the merry evenings us'll have, dear faither, please God; but a
husband's a husband. He've been that wonnerful patient, tu, for su