ief by careless handling in passing through stiff
undergrowth. But a certain ne'er-do-well Mountain, a noted striker and
tosspot of the district, had mysteriously disappeared about that date,
and had never since come within scope of Castle Barfield knowledge.
Ugly rumours had got afloat, vague and formless, and soon to die out
of general memory. Dick listened open-mouthed to all this, and when the
narrative was concluded, held his peace for at least two minutes.

'_She_ isn't wicked, is she, Aunt Jenny?' he suddenly demanded.

'She? Who? 'asked Mrs. Eusker in return. 'The little girl, Julia.'

'Wicked? Sakes alive, whativer is the boy talking about? Wicked? O'
course not. She's a dear good little thing as iver lived.'

'Ichabod said that all the Mountains were wicked. But I know Joe
isn't--at least, not very. He promised me a monkey and a parrot--a green
parrot, when he came back from running away. But he didn't run away,
because father found him and took him home. His father gave him an awful
thrashing. He often thrashes him, Joe says. Father never thrashes me.
What does his father thrash him for?' 'Mr. Mountain's a harder man than
your father, my dear. An' I fear as Joe's a bit wild, like his father
when he was a boy, and obstinit. Theer niver was a obstinater man i'
this earth than Samson Mountain, I do believe, an' Joe's got a bit on it
in him.'

'She's pretty,' said Dick, returning with sudden childish inconsequence
to the subject uppermost in his thoughts. 'Joe isn't Why is it that the
girls are always prettier than the boys?'

'I used to think it was the other way about when I was a gell,' said
Aunt Jenny, with perfect simplicity. 'But she is pretty, that's true.
But then her mother was a likely lass, an' Samson warn't bad lookin',
if he hadn't ha' been so fierce an' cussid. An' to think as it should be
you, of all the lads i' Barfield, as should save a Mountain. An' a gell
too.. I suppose as you'll be a settin' up to fall in love wi' her now,
like Romeo and Juliet?'

'What was that? 'asked the boy.

'It's a play, my dear, wrote by a clever man as has been dead iver so
many 'ears, William Shaakespeare.'

'Shakespeare?' said Dick. 'I know. It's a big book on one of the shelves
at home, full of poetry. But what's Romeo and Juliet?'

'Romeo and Juliet was two lovers, as lived a long time ago in a place
called Verona. I don't know where it is,' she added quickly, to stave
off the imminent question already