ts of wind driving the
showers like a solid sheet eastward. We had a hard fight up the breast
of the mountain; and the house looked bleak and desolate, for the men
were all in the barn threshing, and the women in the kitchen at the
butter-troughs. I stood in the porch to catch my breath, and take my
plaid from around the child; and I heard father in a loud, solemn voice
saying the Collect,--father always spoke in that way when he was saying
the Confession or the Collect,--and I knew very well that he would be
standing at that east window, with his prayer-book open on the sill. So
I waited until I heard the 'Amen,' and then I lifted the latch and went
in. He turned around and faced me; and his eyes fell at once upon little
Steve, who was a bonny lad then, more than three years old. 'I have come
back to you, father,' I said, 'I and my little Steve.'--'Where is thy
husband?' he asked. I said, 'He is in the grave. I did wrong, and I am
sorry, father."

"'Then I forgive thee.' That was all he said. His eyes were fixed upon
Steve, for he never had a son of his own; and he held out his hands, and
Steve went straight to him; and he lifted the boy, and kissed him again
and again, and from that moment he loved him with all his soul. He never
cast up to me the wrong I had done; and by and by I told him all that
had happened to me, and we never more had a secret between us, but
worked together for one end; and what that end was, some day you may
find out. I wish you would write a word or two to Steve. A word would
bring him home, dear."

"But I cannot write it, Ducie. I promised father there should be no
love-making between us, and I would not break a word that father trusts
in. Besides, Stephen is too proud and too honorable to have any
underhand courting. When he can walk in and out Seat-Sandal in dayshine
and in dark, and as every one's equal, he will come to see me. Until
then we can trust each other and wait."

"What does the squire think of Steve's plans? Maybe, now, they are not
very pleasant to him. I remember at the sheep-shearing he did not say
very much."

"He did not say very much because he never thought that Steve was in
earnest. Father does not like changes, and you know how land-owners
regard traders. And I'm sure you wouldn't even one of our shepherd-lads
with a man that minds a loom. The brave fellows, travelling the
mountain-tops in the fiercest storms to fold the sheep, or seek some
stray or weakly lamb, ar