was three o'clock in the afternoon when they emerged from the last
piece of woods and entered upon a cultivated clearing, in which stood an
old-fashioned farmhouse, with a steep roof with gable ends, dormer
windows, and wide porches, surrounded by its barn, granaries and negro
quarters.

As Miss Grandiere pulled up at the horse block before the door, a lady,
tall, stately, handsome, with a fair complexion, blue eyes and brown hair,
very like Miss Grandiere herself, and handsomely dressed in a puce-colored
silk pelisse, and a beaver bonnet, appeared at the door, and said:

"You haven't time to stop, Sukey. Sally and the children are all well, and
are in the storeroom picking over apples. You can see them when we come
home this evening; but now we must hurry; so you just get down and set the
child in your seat, and let Dan lead the horse, and we will walk through
the woods to Miss Sibby's. I don't know what is going on there, but
something is."

"I thought it was hot biscuits out of the new flour," said Miss
Grandiere.

"Yes, it is that, too," replied Mrs. Hedge, without perceiving the
sarcasm; "but there is something else--something that that wild young
blade, Roland Bayard, and that young Midshipman Force, have on foot. I
know there is!"

"Roland Bayard! Has he come home?"

"So Gad says. I couldn't get much out of that nigger, though. He said he
was in a hurry, and hadn't time to stop. He said he had to carry that bag
of wheat to the mill and get it ground, and carry it back home in time to
make bread for supper; so you see I couldn't get much out of him."

By this time the new order of procession was formed, and the sisters
walked on together, followed by little Rosemary on the saddle, and Dan
leading the horse.

"I should not think," said Miss Grandiere, "that young Midshipman Force
would feel very much like skylarking after such a disappointment and
mortification as he has had."

"No would you, now? But then he was a mere boy, and she only a child, when
they were engaged; and then after three years, you know, both might have
changed their minds," suggested practical Mrs. Hedge.

"I don't know," sighed sentimental Miss Grandiere.

"Well, I tell you, of all the scapegrace, devil-may-care, never-do-well,
neck-or-nothing boys that ever lived or died in this world, that Roland
Bayard is the very worst! I am sorry young Force has anything to do with
him."

"I don't think he is evil at heart," pleaded Miss G