oung woman having at his entry kept her face over the
newspaper, and then got away to the back part of the room. 'And are you
and your mother always going to stay down there in the mill-house
watching the little fishes, Miss Anne?'

She said that it was uncertain, in a tone of truthful precision which the
question was hardly worth, looking forcedly at him as she spoke. But she
blushed fitfully, in her arms and hands as much as in her face. Not that
she was overpowered by the great boots, formidable spurs, and other
fierce appliances of his person, as he imagined; simply she had not been
prepared to meet him there.

'I hope you will, I am sure, for my own good,' said he, letting his eyes
linger on the round of her cheek.

Anne became a little more dignified, and her look showed reserve. But
the yeoman on perceiving this went on talking to her in so civil a way
that he irresistibly amused her, though she tried to conceal all feeling.
At a brighter remark of his than usual her mouth moved, her upper lip
playing uncertainly over her white teeth; it would stay still--no, it
would withdraw a little way in a smile; then it would flutter down again;
and so it wavered like a butterfly in a tender desire to be pleased and
smiling, and yet to be also sedate and composed; to show him that she did
not want compliments, and yet that she was not so cold as to wish to
repress any genuine feeling he might be anxious to utter.

'Shall you want any more reading, Mr. Derriman?' said she, interrupting
the younger man in his remarks. 'If not, I'll go homeward.'

'Don't let me hinder you longer,' said Festus. 'I'm off in a minute or
two, when your man has cleaned my boots.'

'Ye don't hinder us, nephew. She must have the paper: 'tis the day for
her to have 'n. She might read a little more, as I have had so little
profit out o' en hitherto. Well, why don't ye speak? Will ye, or won't
ye, my dear?'

'Not to two,' she said.

'Ho, ho! damn it, I must go then, I suppose,' said Festus, laughing; and
unable to get a further glance from her he left the room and clanked into
the back yard, where he saw a man; holding up his hand he cried, 'Anthony
Cripplestraw!'

Cripplestraw came up in a trot, moved a lock of his hair and replaced it,
and said, 'Yes, Maister Derriman.' He was old Mr. Derriman's odd hand in
the yard and garden, and like his employer had no great pretensions to
manly beauty, owing to a limpness of backbone and spec