nsey had been.

Mary flew to Simmons to know where her old frock had gone to. The good
woman, who by this time had taken Mary under her wing to uphold her
against the rest of the household if it were inclined to resent the new
inmate, looked at her reprovingly.

"You never wanted that old frock, and you her ladyship's companion? No,
Miss Mary--for so I shall call you, as by her ladyship's orders, let
some people say what they like--that frock you never will see, for gone
it has to a poor child that'll maybe find it a comfort when winter
comes. I wonder at you for thinking on it, so I do, seeing as how I've
taken so much trouble with your clothes."

Mary turned away with a desolate feeling. The grey linsey might have
been like the feathers of the enchanted bird that became a woman for the
love of a mortal, the feathers which, if she wore them again, had the
power of transporting her back to her kindred and her old estate. The
old life was indeed closed to Mary with the disappearance of the grey
linsey; and it was long before she lost the feeling that if she could
only have kept her old garments she need not have been so separated from
the old life.

CHAPTER IV

BOY AND GIRL

It was during those early days that Mary made the acquaintance of Robin
Drummond. She had a comfortless feeling afterwards about the meeting;
but it was not because of Sir Robin or anything he did: he was always a
kind boy in her memory of him. It was because of his mother, Lady
Drummond. Mary knew from Lady Anne, who always thought aloud, that Lady
Drummond made a good many people feel uncomfortable.

They had driven out all the way from the city to the Court, the big
house on its wide plain below the mountains. It was a long drive--quite
twenty miles there and back--and Jennings, who liked to have a good deal
of his time to himself, had been rather cross about it. Not that he
dared show any temper to Lady Anne, who was easy and kindly with her
servants, as a rule, but could reduce an insubordinate one to humble
submission as well as any old lady ever could. But Mary, who knew the
household pretty well by this time, knew that Jennings was out of temper
by the set of his shoulders, as she surveyed them from her seat in the
barouche. It was a road, too, he never liked to take, because of a
certain steam tram which ran along it and made the horses uncomfortable
when they met it face to face. And there his mistress was unsympathetic
tow