thee. But doan't ee marry in Varley, Polly. My Luke's been
a good husband to me. But thou know'st what the most of them be--they
may do for Varley bred gals, but not for the like of thee. And when thou
goest take baby wi' thee and bring her up like thysel till she be old
enough to coom back and look arter Luke and the house."

Polly was crying quietly while the dying woman was speaking. The doctor,
on leaving that morning, had told her that he could do no more and
that Mrs. Marner was sinking rapidly. Kneeling now beside the bed she
promised to do all that her adopted mother asked her, adding, "and I
shall never, never leave feyther as long as he lives."

The woman smiled faintly.

"Many a girl ha' said that afore now, Polly, and ha' changed her moind
when the roight man asked her. Don't ee make any promises that away,
lass. 'Tis natural that, when a lassie's time comes, she should wed; and
if Luke feels loanly here, why he's got it in his power to get another
to keep house for him. He be but a little over forty now; and as he ha'
lived steady and kept hisself away from drink, he be a yoonger man now
nor many a one ten year yoonger. Don't ye think to go to sacrifice your
loife to hissen. And now, child, read me that chapter over agin, and
then I think I could sleep a bit."

Before morning Eliza Marner had passed away, and Polly became the head
of her uncle's house. Two years had passed, and so far Mary Powlett
showed no signs of leaving the house, which, even the many women in the
village, who envied her for her prettiness and neatness and disliked her
for what they called her airs, acknowledged that she managed well.
But it was not from lack of suitors. There were at least half a dozen
stalwart young croppers who would gladly have paid court to her had
there been the smallest sign on her part of willingness to accept their
attentions; but Polly, though bright and cheerful and pleasant to
all, afforded to none of them an opportunity for anything approaching
intimacy.

On Sundays, the times alone when their occupations enabled the youth of
Varley to devote themselves to attentions to the maidens they favored,
Mary Powlett was not to be found at home after breakfast, for, having
set everything in readiness for dinner, she always started for Marsden,
taking little Susan with her, and there spent the day with the woman who
had even more than Eliza Marner been her mother. She had, a month after
his wife's death, fought