e following afternoon at her window, gazing westward in no
small perturbation of spirit.

It wanted a few minutes to five when a carrier pigeon came travelling
across the zenith, shot downwards suddenly, and alighted on the roof.
Ann climbed to the trap-door and put out a hand. The bird was
preening his feathers, and allowed himself to be taken easily.

In circumstances less agitating Ann had not failed to observe that
the thread about the messenger's wing was not of the kind that Master
Simon used. But her eyes opened wide as they fell on the
handwriting, and still wider as she read:

"_It is all for the best, perhaps. If only people have not begun to
talk_.--Prudence."

A second messenger arrived towards evening with word of Harmony's
success. But the news hardly relaxed Ann's brow, which kept a
pensive contraction even when her master arrived next evening and
poured out her winnings on the table from the silver challenge cup.

She wore this frown at intervals for a fortnight, and all the while
maintained an unusual silence which puzzled Master Simon. Then one
morning he heard her in the kitchen scolding the tap-boy with all her
pristine heartiness. That night, after mulling her master's ale, she
turned at the door, saucepan in hand, and coughed to attract
attention.

"Well, Ann; what is it?"

"You've been philanderin'."

"Hey! Upon my word, Ann--"

Ann produced the Widow Waddilove's note and flattened it out under
Master Simon's eyes. And Master Simon blushed painfully.

"Are you goin' to marry the woman?" Ann demanded.

"I think not."

"I reckon you will."

"Well, you see, there has been a hitch. She won't leave the
'Pandora's Box,' and I'm not going to budge from 'Flowing Source.'
If a woman won't put herself out to that extent--Besides, she cooks
no better than you."

"Not so well. You wasn't thinking, by any chance, o' marrying _me_?"

"Ann, you're perfectly brazen! Well, no; to tell you the plain
truth, I wasn't."

"That's all right; because I've gone and promised myself to a young
farmer up the valley."

"What's his name?"

"I shan't tell you; for the reason that I've a second to fall back
on, if I find on acquaintance that the first won't do. But first or
second, I'll marry one or t'other at the month-end, and so I give you
notice."

Master Simon sighed. "Well! well! I must get on as best I can with
Tom for a while." Tom was the tap-boy.

"Tom's going, too. I bullied