friend before I
return, come here and ask for the clergyman who is going to take my duty.
I will tell him about you, and he will help you until I come home.'

That afternoon Stephen retraced his lonely path across the hills in great
gladness of heart; and when he came to Fern's Hollow, he leaped lightly
down the bank against which the old stove-pipe had been reared as a
chimney, and stood again on the site of the old hearth, in the midst of
the new walls of red bricks that were being built up. How the master
could remove the new house and restore the old hut was a question of some
perplexity to him; but his confidence in the parson at Danesford was so
perfect, that he did not doubt for a moment that he could call Fern's
Hollow his own again next spring.

CHAPTER XII.

VISIT OF BLACK BESS.

Everybody at Botfield was astonished at the change in Stephen's manner;
so cheerful was he, and light-hearted, as if his brief manhood had passed
away, with its burden of cares and anxieties, and his boyish freedom and
gladsomeness had come back again. The secret cause remained undiscovered;
for Martha, fluent in tongue as she was, had enough discretion to keep
her own counsel, and seal up her lips as close as wax, when it was
necessary. The people puzzled themselves in vain; and Black Thompson left
off hinting at revenge to Stephen. Even the master, when the boy passed
him with a respectful bow, in which there was nothing of resentment or
sullenness, wondered how he could so soon forget the great injury he had
suffered. Mr. Wyley would have been better satisfied if the whole family
could have been driven out of the neighbourhood; but there was no knowing
what ugly rumours and inquiries might be set afloat, if the boy went
telling his tale to nobody knows whom.

Upon the whole, Martha did not very much regret her change of dwelling,
though she made a great virtue of her patience in submitting quietly to
it. To be sure, the cinder-hill was unsightly, and the cabin blackened
with smoke; and it was necessary to lock little Nan and grandfather
safely within the house whenever she went out, lest they should get to
the mouth of the open shaft, where Stephen often amused the child by
throwing stones down it, and listening to their rebound against the
sides. But still Martha had near neighbours; and until now she had hardly
even tasted the luxury of a thorough gossip, which she could enjoy in any
one of the cottages throughout Bo