E "GREEN DRAGON"

Nance Holdaway was on her knees before the fire blowing the green wood
that voluminously smoked upon the dogs, and only now and then shot forth
a smothered flame; her knees already ached and her eyes smarted, for she
had been some while at this ungrateful task, but her mind was gone far
away to meet the coming stranger. Now she met him in the wood, now at
the castle gate, now in the kitchen by candle-light; each fresh
presentment eclipsed the one before; a form so elegant, manners so
sedate, a countenance so brave and comely, a voice so winning and
resolute--sure such a man was never seen! The thick-coming fancies
poured and brightened in her head like the smoke and flames upon the
hearth.

Presently the heavy foot of her uncle Jonathan was heard upon the stair,
and as he entered the room she bent the closer to her work. He glanced
at the green fagots with a sneer, and looked askance at the bed and the
white sheets, at the strip of carpet laid, like an island, on the great
expanse of the stone floor, and at the broken glazing of the casement
clumsily repaired with paper.

"Leave that fire a-be," he cried. "What, have I toiled all my life to
turn innkeeper at the hind end? Leave it a-be, I say."

"La, uncle, it doesn't burn a bit; it only smokes," said Nance, looking
up from her position.

"You are come of decent people of both sides," returned the old man.
"Who are you to blow the coals for any Robin-run-agate? Get up, get on
your hood, make yourself useful, and be off to the 'Green Dragon.'"

"I thought you was to go yourself," Nance faltered.

"So did I," quoth Jonathan; "but it appears I was mistook."

The very excess of her eagerness alarmed her, and she began to hang
back. "I think I would rather not, dear uncle," she said. "Night is at
hand, and I think, dear, I would rather not."

"Now you look here," replied Jonathan, "I have my lord's orders, have I
not? Little he gives me, but it's all my livelihood. And do you fancy,
if I disobey my lord, I'm likely to turn round for a lass like you? No,
I've that hell-fire of pain in my old knee, I wouldn't walk a mile, not
for King George upon his bended knees." And he walked to the window and
looked down the steep scarp to where the river foamed in the bottom of
the dell.

Nance stayed for no more bidding. In her own room, by the glimmer of the
twilight, she washed her hands and pulled on her Sunday mittens;
adjusted her black hood, and tied