nt
points in the proposed pathway, and by the time that Anne had dressed
herself each section of the length had been connected with those above
and below it, so that a continuous and easy track was formed from the
crest of the down to the bottom of the steep.

The down rested on a bed of solid chalk, and the surface exposed by the
roadmakers formed a white ribbon, serpenting from top to bottom.

Then the relays of working soldiers all disappeared, and, not long after,
a troop of dragoons in watering order rode forward at the top and began
to wind down the new path. They came lower and closer, and at last were
immediately beneath her window, gathering themselves up on the space by
the mill-pond. A number of the horses entered it at the shallow part,
drinking and splashing and tossing about. Perhaps as many as thirty,
half of them with riders on their backs, were in the water at one time;
the thirsty animals drank, stamped, flounced, and drank again, letting
the clear, cool water dribble luxuriously from their mouths. Miller
Loveday was looking on from over his garden hedge, and many admiring
villagers were gathered around.

Gazing up higher, Anne saw other troops descending by the new road from
the camp, those which had already been to the pond making room for these
by withdrawing along the village lane and returning to the top by a
circuitous route.

Suddenly the miller exclaimed, as in fulfilment of expectation, 'Ah,
John, my boy; good morning!' And the reply of 'Morning, father,' came
from a well-mounted soldier near him, who did not, however, form one of
the watering party. Anne could not see his face very clearly, but she
had no doubt that this was John Loveday.

There were tones in the voice which reminded her of old times, those of
her very infancy, when Johnny Loveday had been top boy in the village
school, and had wanted to learn painting of her father. The deeps and
shallows of the mill-pond being better known to him than to any other man
in the camp, he had apparently come down on that account, and was
cautioning some of the horsemen against riding too far in towards the
mill-head.

Since her childhood and his enlistment Anne had seen him only once, and
then but casually, when he was home on a short furlough. His figure was
not much changed from what it had been; but the many sunrises and sunsets
which had passed since that day, developing her from a comparative child
to womanhood, had abstracte