head and shoulders of Archelaus, furze-laden, passed the window,
apparently floating through the luminous warmth of afternoon that filled
the courtyard as through the depths of the sea. The illusion was
shattered when he kicked the door open and, striding in, flung his
burden on to the dying fire. The sudden glow that leapt up revealed Tom
ensconced in the settle, cleaning his boots with a pat of butter stolen
from the dairy. He continued his occupation quite unmoved by the
fulminations of his mother, bending his ruddy head over the boots. Tom
was the "red-headed Dane" who crops up generation after generation in
some Cornish families.

"Hold your tongue, mother," he said at last, holding one boot at arm's
length and cocking his head sideways the better to admire the effect of
the buttering; "I'm going to look decent to-night if no one else is. And
so I don't mind a-tellen' 'ee--" with a sudden slip into the dialect
that he studiously trained himself to avoid. Any lapse of the kind meant
that Tom was not in a mood to be trifled with, and Annie turned suddenly
to Archelaus.

"Where's the cheild?" she asked.

"I set'n to gather bullock's glows for th' fire--we shall want more'n
furze for to-night," replied Archelaus. "Give I a light to take
overstairs; 'tes time I was cleanen' of myself. I'm gwain to run with
the Neck to-night."

Annie went obediently to a cupboard and took out a little cup of oil in
which a wick lay, the tongue of it drooping over the cup's rim. She lit
it with a twig from the fire and stood looking at Archelaus for a moment
with the cup in her hand. The footlight effect softened her
prominently-boned face and struck some of the over-strong colour from
her cheeks--she showed a faint hint of the prettiness that had attracted
the old Squire.

"An' who is it you'm thinken' will be at the door for 'ee to kiss when
you get in wi' the Neck?" she asked grimly.

Archelaus shuffled from one big foot to the other.

"Jenifer Keast, maybe?" pursued his mother.

"Happen Jenifer, happen another. A maid's a maid," mumbled the
disconcerted Archelaus.

Tom put his boots on the settle and stood up.

"It makes me sick to hear you, Archelaus," he declared slowly, but with
extraordinary venom for a boy of fifteen; "Jenifer Keast! Have you no
sense of who you are that you should think of Jenifer Keast?"

"She'm a fitty maid," muttered Archelaus.

"A fitty maid! Listen to the great bufflehead! She's fitty enough