g! Upon my--"

"Mabyn!"

"Upon my--trotting pony: that was all I was going to say. Wenna, will
you stay here for a minute, and I'll run down to the foot of the hill
and get a match?"

"How can you get a match at the foot of the hill? You'll have to go on
to the inn. No, tie your handkerchief round the foot of one of the
trees, and come up early in the morning to look."

"Early in the morning?" said Mabyn. "I hope to be in--I mean asleep
then."

Twice she had nearly blurted out the secret, and it is highly probable
that her refusal to adopt Wenna's suggestion would have led her sister
to suspect something had not Wenna herself by accident kicked against
the missing brooch. As it was, the time lost by this misadventure was
grievous to Mabyn, who now insisted on leading the way, and went along
through the bushes at a rattling pace. Here and there the belated
wanderers startled a blackbird, that went shrieking its fright over to
the other side of the valley, but Mabyn was now too much preoccupied to
be unnerved.

"Keeping a lookout ahead?" Wenna called.

"Ay, ay, sir! No ghosts on the weather quarter! Ship drawing twenty
fathoms and the mate fast asleep. Oh, Wenna, my hat!"

It had been twitched off her head by one of the branches of the young
trees through which she was passing, and the pliant bit of wood, being
released from the strain, had thrown it down into the dark bushes and
briers.

"Well I'm--No, I'm not!" said Mabyn as she picked out the hat from among
the thorns and straightened the twisted feather. Then she set out again,
impatient over these delays, and yet determined not to let her courage
sink.

"Land ahead yet?" called out Wenna.

"Ay, ay, sir, and the Lizard on our lee. Wind south-south-west and the
cargo shifting a point to the east. Hurrah!"

"Mabyn, they'll hear you a mile off."

It was certainly Mabyn's intention that she should be heard at least a
quarter of a mile off, for now they had got down to the open, and they
could hear the stream some way ahead of them, which they would have to
cross. At this point Mabyn paused for a second to let her sister
overtake her: then they went on arm-in-arm.

"Oh, Wenna," she said, "do you remember 'young Lochinvar'?"

"Of course."

"Didn't you fall in love with him when you read about him? Now, there
_was_ somebody to fall in love with! Don't you remember when he came
into Netherby Hall, that

The bride-maidens whispered, ''Twere better b