"I wish as you wish; but, O Ned, you would be a long, long time absent
from us--months and months, or perhaps years and years. Uncle Pack says
that he was once five years without setting foot on English ground, and
you might be as long away. We shouldn't know you when you came back;
you will be grown into a big man, with a bronzed face and bushy
whiskers." Mary laughed, though the tears at the same time came into
her eyes.

"But that was in the war-time, Mary, and even the Queen's ships are not
now kept out for so long a period, while merchant vessels return every
year, and sometimes from short voyages much oftener. And then think of
all the curiosities I should bring home; I should delight in collecting
them for you and Aunt Sally, or to add to Uncle Pack's museum."

"Yes, yes, it would be a very joyous time when you did come back, we
should be delighted to see all the things you brought; but then think
how slowly the days will pass by when you are away, uncle and aunt and I
all alone."

"There would be only one less," said Ned, naturally.

"Yes, I know," answered Mary--she stopped short--she did not say how
large a space Ned occupied in her world. She was not aware of it
herself just then.

The subject was one which made her feel sadder than was her wont, and
she was glad to change it.

Old Shank's cottage was soon reached. It stood about half a mile from
the village. It was situated in a hollow, an old quarry, by the side of
a hill, the bare downs rising beyond it without a tree near. A
desolate-looking place in its best days. Though containing several
rooms--a large part of the roof having fallen in--it had only one which
was habitable. In that lived Silas Shank the reputed miser. The
palings which fenced it in had been broken down to be used as firewood.
The gate was off its hinges; nettles and other hardy weeds had taken
possession of the garden. Scarcely a pane of glass remained in any of
the windows; even those of the rooms occupied by the miser were stuffed
with rags, or had pieces of brown paper pasted over them.

"I'll stay outside while you go in," said Ned; "the old man was very
surly when I last saw him, and I do not wish to face him again. He
can't be rough to you."

Mary knocked at the door, which was tightly closed.

"Who's there?" asked a tremulous voice.

"It is I, Mary Pack; I've brought you something from aunt which she
thought you would like to have."

The bars were wi