t of her pocket a dainty pair of ivory
writing tablets, such as only the minister of the parish used in all
Eden Valley, and he only because he had married a great London lady for
his wife.

"I shall be glad of the name and address of the persons to whom you
refer!" said Miss Irma (for so from that moment I began to call her in
my heart).

"The factors and agents for this estate," Josiah Kettle enunciated
grandly. The writing tablets were shut up with a snap of disappointment.

"Oh, Messrs. Smart, Poole & Smart," she said. "Why, I have known them
ever since I was as high as little Louis."

Then she smiled indulgently upon Mr. Kettle, with something so easily
grand and yet so sweet that I think the hearts of all went out to her.

"I suppose," she said, "that really you thought you were doing right in
coming here and firing off guns without permission. It must be an
astonishing thing for you to see this house of the Maitlands inhabited
after so long. I do not blame your curiosity, but I fear I must ask you
to send a competent man to repair our windows. For that we hold you
responsible, Mr. Officer, and you, Mr. Justice of the Peace--you and
your son Jo! Don't we, Louis?"

"I will see to that myself!" a voice, the same that had spoken before,
came from the crowd. Miss Irma searched the circle without, however,
coming to a conclusion. I do think that her glance lingered longer on my
face than on any of the others, perhaps because Gerty Greensleeves was
leaning on my shoulder and whispering in my ear. (What a nuisance girls
are, sometimes!) So the glance passed on, with something in it at once
calm and simple and high.

"If any of the gentlefolk of our station will call upon us," she went
on, "we will tell _them_ how we came to be here--the clergyman of the
parish--or----" here she hesitated for the first time, "or his wife."

Instinctively she seemed to feel the difficulty. "Though we are not of
their faith!" she added, smiling once more as with the air of serene
condescension she had shown all through.

Then she nodded, and swept a curtsey with an undulating grace which I
thought to be adorable, in spite of the suspicion of irony in it.

"Good-bye, good people," she said, letting her eyes again run the
circuit of the sea of faces, reinforced by those who had been firing
their blunderbusses and horse-pistols (now carefully concealed) so
uselessly at the back windows of the house. "We are obliged for your
visit.