etters? And the postman to know all as in 'em for anything
anybody knows, and grandfather to be almost sure to see 'em. I don't
call letters no good at all, and I beg you won't write 'em any more.'

'Did he see them?'

'No thanks to you if he didn't. I don't know why you are come here,
Sir Felix,--nor yet I don't know why I should come and meet you. It's
all just folly like.'

'Because I love you;--that's why I come; eh, Ruby? And you have come
because you love me; eh, Ruby? Is not that about it?' Then he threw
himself on the ground beside her, and got his arm round her waist.

It would boot little to tell here all that they said to each other.
The happiness of Ruby Ruggles for that half-hour was no doubt
complete. She had her London lover beside her; and though in every
word he spoke there was a tone of contempt, still he talked of love,
and made her promises, and told her that she was pretty. He probably
did not enjoy it much; he cared very little about her, and carried on
the liaison simply because it was the proper sort of thing for a young
man to do. He had begun to think that the odour of patchouli was
unpleasant, and that the flies were troublesome, and the ground hard,
before the half-hour was over. She felt that she could be content to
sit there for ever and to listen to him. This was a realisation of
those delights of life of which she had read in the thrice-thumbed old
novels which she had gotten from the little circulating library at
Bungay.

But what was to come next? She had not dared to ask him to marry her,--
had not dared to say those very words; and he had not dared to ask her
to be his mistress. There was an animal courage about her, and an
amount of strength also, and a fire in her eye, of which he had
learned to be aware. Before the half-hour was over I think that he
wished himself away;--but when he did go, he made a promise to see her
again on the Tuesday morning. Her grandfather would be at Harlestone
market, and she would meet him at about noon at the bottom of the
kitchen garden belonging to the farm. As he made the promise he
resolved that he would not keep it. He would write to her again, and
bid her come to him in London, and would send her money for the
journey.

'I suppose I am to be his wedded wife,' said Ruby to herself, as she
crept away down from the road, away also from her own home;--so that on
her return her presence should not be associated with that of the
young man, shoul