Kitabı oku: «Mrs. Halliburton's Troubles», sayfa 28

CHAPTER XXIV.
ANNA'S EXCUSE

A very unpleasant part of the story has now to be touched upon. Unpleasant things occur in real life, and if true pictures have to be given of the world as it exists, as it goes on its round, day by day, allusion to them cannot be wholly avoided.

Certain words of William Halliburton to Patience had run in this fashion: "Were Anna to be drawn into a liking for Herbert Dare, I am sure it would not be agreeable to Mr. Lynn. He would never consider the Dares a desirable family for her to marry into." In thus speaking, William had striven to put the case in a polite sort of form to the ears of Patience. As to any probability of marriage between one of the Dares and Anna Lynn, he would scarcely have believed it within the range of possibility. The Dares, one and all, would have considered Anna far beneath them in position, whilst the difference of religion would on Anna's side be an almost insurmountable objection. The worst that William had contemplated was the "liking" he had hinted at. He cared for Anna's welfare as he would have cared for a sister's, and he believed it would not contribute to her happiness that she should become attached to Herbert Dare. But for compromising Anna—and he had given his word not to do it—he would have spoken out openly and said there was a danger of this liking coming to pass, if she met him as he feared she had been in the habit of doing. Certainly he would not have alluded to the remote possibility of marriage, the mention of which had so scared Patience.

What had William thought, what had Patience said, could they have known that this liking was already implanted in Anna's heart beyond recall? Alas! that it should have been so! Quiet, childish, timid as Anna outwardly appeared, the strongest affection had been aroused in her heart for Herbert Dare—was filling its every crevice. These apparently shy, sensitive natures are sometimes only the more passionate and wayward within. One evening a few months previously, Anna was walking in Atterly's Field, behind their house. Anna had been in the habit of walking there—nay, of playing there—since she was a child, and she would as soon have associated harm with their garden as with that field. Farmer Atterly kept his sheep in it, and Anna had run about with the lambs as long as she could remember. Herbert Dare came up accidentally—the path through it, leading along at the back of the houses, was public, though not much frequented—and he spoke to Anna. Anna knew him to say "Good day" when she passed him in the street; and she now and then saw him at Mrs. Ashley's. Herbert stayed talking with her a few minutes, and then went on his way.

Somehow, from that time, he and Anna encountered each other there pretty frequently; and that was how the liking had grown. If a qualm of conscience crossed Miss Anna at times that it was not quite the thing for a young lady to do, thus to meet a gentleman in secret, she conveniently put the qualm away. That harm should arise from it in any way never so much as crossed her mind for a moment; and to do Herbert Dare justice, real harm was probably as far from his mind as from hers.

He grew to like her, almost as she liked him. Herbert Dare did not, in the sight of Helstonleigh, stand out as a model of all the cardinal virtues; but he was not all bad. Anna believed him all good—all honour, truth, excellence; and her heart had flashed out a rebuke to William when he hinted that Herbert was not exactly a paragon. She only knew that the very sound of his footstep made her heart leap with happiness; she only knew that to her he appeared everything that was bright and fascinating. Her great dread was, lest their intimacy should become known and separation ensue. That separation would be inevitable, were her father or Patience to become cognizant of it, Anna rightly believed.

Cunning little sophist that she was! She would fain persuade herself that an innocent meeting out of doors was justifiable, where a meeting indoors was out of the question. They had no acquaintance with the Dares; consequently Herbert could plead no excuse for calling in upon them—none at least that would be likely to carry weight with Patience. And so the young lady reconciled her conscience in the best way she could, stole out as often as she was able to meet him, and left discovery to take care of itself.

Discovery came in the shape of William Halliburton. It was bad enough; but far less alarming to Anna than it might have been. Had her father dropped upon her, she would have run away and fallen into the nearest pond, in her terror and consternation.

Though guilty of certain trifling inaccuracies—such as protesting that she "did not care" for Herbert Dare—Anna, in that interview with William, fully meant to keep the promise she made, not to meet him again. Promises, however, given under the influence of terror or other sudden emotion, are not always kept. It would probably prove so with Anna's. One thing was indisputable—that where a mind could so far forget its moral rectitude as to practise deceit in one particular, as Anna was doing, it would not be very scrupulous to keep its better promises.

Anna's thoughts for many a morning latterly, when she arose, had been "This evening I shall see him," and the prospect seemed to quicken her fingers, as it quickened her heart. But on the morning after the discovery, her first thought was, "I must never see him again as I have done. How shall I warn him not to come?" That he would be in the field again that evening, unless warned, she knew: if William Halliburton saw him there a quarrel might ensue between them; at any rate, an unpleasant scene. Anna came down, feeling cross and petulant, and inclined to wish William had been at the bottom of the sea before he had found them out the previous evening.

"Where there's a will, there's a way," it is said. Anna Lynn contrived that day to exemplify it. Her will was set upon seeing Herbert Dare, and she did see him: it can scarcely be said by accident. Anna contrived to be sent into the town by Patience on an errand, and she managed to linger so long in the neighbourhood of Mr. Dare's office, gazing in at the shops in West Street (if Patience had only seen her!), that Herbert Dare passed.

"Anna!"

"Herbert, I have been waiting in the hope of seeing thee," she whispered, her manner timid as a fawn, her pretty cheeks blushing. "Thee must not come again in the evening, for I cannot meet thee."

"Why so?" asked Herbert.

"William Halliburton saw me with thee last night, and he says it is not right. I had to give him my promise not to meet thee again, or he would have told my father."

Herbert cast a word to William; not a complimentary one. "What business is it of his?" he asked.

"I dare not stay talking to thee, Herbert. Patience will likely be sending Grace after me, finding me so long away. But I was obliged to tell thee this, lest thee should be coming again. Fare thee well!"

Passing swiftly from him, Anna went on her way. Herbert did not choose to follow her in the open street. She went along, poor child, with her head down and her eyelashes glistening. It was little else than bitter sorrow thus to part with Herbert Dare.

Patience was standing at the door, looking out for her when she came in sight of home. Patience had given little heed to what William Halliburton had said the previous night, or she might not have sent Anna into Helstonleigh alone. In point of fact, Patience had thought William a little fanciful. But when, instead of being home at four o'clock, as she ought to have been, the clock struck five, and she had not made her appearance, Patience began to think she did let her have too much liberty.

"Now, where hast thee been?" was Patience's salutation, delivered in icy tones.

"I met so many people, Patience. They stayed to talk with me."

Brushing past Patience, deaf to her subsequent reproofs, Anna flew up to her own room. When she came down, her father had entered, and Patience was pouring out the tea.

"Wilt thee tell thy father where thee hast been?"

The command was delivered in Patience's driest tone. Anna, inwardly tormented, outwardly vexed, burst into tears. The Quaker looked up in surprise.

Patience explained. Anna had left home at three o'clock to execute a little commission: she might well have been home in three-quarters of an hour and she had only made her appearance now.

"What kept thee, child?" asked her father.

"I only looked in at a shop or two," pleaded Anna, through her tears. "There were the prettiest new engravings in at Thomas Woakam's! If Patience had wanted me to run both ways, she should have said so."

Notwithstanding the little spice of impertinence peeping out in the last sentence, Samuel Lynn saw no reason to correct Anna. That she could ever be wrong, he scarcely admitted to his own heart. "Dry thy tears, child, and take thy tea," said he. "Patience wanted thee, maybe, for some household matter; it can wait another opportunity. Patience," he added, as if to drown the sound of his words and their remembrance, "are my shirts in order?"

"Thy shirts in order?" repeated Patience. "Why dost thee ask that?"

"I should not have asked it without reason," returned he. "Wilt thee please give me an answer?"

"The old shirts are as much in order as things, beginning to wear, can be," replied Patience. "Thy new shirts I cannot say much about. They will not be finished this side Midsummer, unless Anna sits to them a little closer than she is doing now."

"Thy shirts will be ready quite in time, father; before the old ones are gone beyond wearing," spoke up Anna.

"I don't know that," said Mr. Lynn. "Had they been ready, child, I might have wanted them now. I am going a journey."

"Is it the French journey thee hast talked of once or twice lately?" interposed Patience.

"Yes," said Samuel Lynn. "The master was speaking to me about it this afternoon. We were interrupted, and I did not altogether gather when he wishes me to start; but I fancy it will be immediately–"

"Oh, father! couldst thee not take me?"

The interruption came from Anna. Her blue eyes were glistening, her cheeks were crimson; a journey to the interior of France wore charms for her as great as it did for Cyril Dare. All the way home from West Street she had been thinking how she should spend her miserable home days, debarred of the evening snatches of Mr. Herbert's charming society. Going to France would be something.

"I wish I could take thee, child! But thee art aware thee might as well ask me to take the Malvern Hills."

In her inward conviction, Anna believed she might. Before she could oppose any answering but most useless argument, Samuel Lynn's attention was directed to the road. Parting opposite to his house, as if they had just walked together from the manufactory, were Mr. Ashley and William Halliburton. The master walked on. William, catching Samuel Lynn's eye, came across and entered.

Mr. Ashley had been telling William some news. Though no vacillating man in a general way, it appeared that he had again reconsidered his determination with regard to despatching William to France. He had come to the resolve to send him, as well as Samuel Lynn. William could not help surmising that his betrayed emotion the previous night, his fears touching Mr. Ashley's reason for not sending him, may have had something to do with that gentleman's change of mind.

"Will you be troubled with me?" asked he of Mr. Lynn, when he had imparted this to him.

"If such be the master's fiat, I cannot help being troubled with thee," was the answer of Samuel Lynn; but the tone of his voice spoke of anything rather than dissatisfaction. "Why is he sending thee as well as myself?"

"He told me he thought it might be best that you should show me the markets, and introduce me to the skin merchants, as I should probably have to make the journey alone in future," replied William. "I had no idea, until the master mentioned it now, that you had ever made the journey yourself, Mr. Lynn; you never told me."

"There was nothing, that I am aware of, to call for the information," observed the Quaker, in his usual dry manner. "I went there two or three times on my own account when I was in business for myself. Did the master tell thee when he should expect us to start?"

"Not precisely. The beginning of the week, I think."

"I have been asking my father if he cannot take me," put in Anna, in plaintive tones, looking at William.

"And I have answered her, that she may as well ask me to take the Malvern Hills," was the rejoinder of Samuel Lynn. "I could as likely take the one as the other."

Likely or unlikely, Samuel Lynn would have taken her beyond all doubt—taken her with a greedy, sheltering grasp—had he foreseen the result of leaving her at home, the grievous trouble that was to fall upon her head.

"Thee wilt drink a dish of tea with us this evening, William?"

It was Patience who spoke. William hesitated, but he saw they would be pleased at his doing so, and he sat down. The conversation turned upon France—upon Samuel Lynn's experiences, and William's anticipations. Anna lapsed into silence and abstraction.

In the bustle of moving, when Samuel Lynn was departing for the manufactory, William, before going home to his books, contrived to obtain a word alone with Anna.

"Have you thought of our compact?"

"Yes," she said, freely meeting his eyes in honest truth. "I saw him this afternoon in the street; I went on purpose to try and meet him. He will not come again."

"That is well. Mind and take care of yourself, Anna," he added, with a smile. "I shall be away, and not able to give an eye to you, as I freely confess it had been my resolve to do."

Anna shook her head. "He does not come again," she repeated. "Thee may go away believing me, William."

And William did go away believing her—went away to France putting faith in her; thinking that the undesirable intimacy was at an end for ever.

CHAPTER XXV.
PATIENCE COME TO GRIEF

In the early part of March, Samuel Lynn and William departed on their journey to France. And the first thought that occurred to Patience afterwards was one that is apt to occur to many thrifty housekeepers on the absence of the master—that of instituting a thorough cleansing of the house, from garret to cellar; or, as Anna mischievously expressed it, "turning the house inside out." She knew Patience did not like her wild phrases, and therefore she used them.

Patience was parting with Grace—the servant who had been with them so many years. Grace had resolved to get married. In vain Patience assured her that marriage, generally speaking, was found to be nothing better than a bed of thorns. Grace would not listen. Others had risked the thorns before her, and she thought she must try her chance with the rest. Patience had no resource but to fall in with the decision, and to look out for another servant. It appeared that she could not readily find one; at least, one whom she would venture to engage. She was unusually particular; and while she waited and looked out, she engaged Hester Dell, a humble member of her own persuasion, to come in temporarily. Hester lived with her aged mother, not far off, chiefly supporting herself by doing fine needlework at her own, or at the Friends' houses. She readily consented to take up her abode with Patience for a month or so, to help with the housework, and looked upon it as a sort of holiday.

"It's of no use to begin the house until Grace shall be gone," observed Patience to Anna. "She'd likely be scrubbing the paper on the walls, instead of the paint, for her head is turned just now."

"What fun, if she should!" ejaculated Anna.

"Fun for thee, perhaps, who art ignorant of cost and labour," rebuked Patience. "I shall wait until Grace has departed. The day that she goes, Hester comes in; and I shall have the house begun the day following."

"Couldn't thee have it begun the same day?" saucily asked Anna.

"Will thee attend to thy stitching?" returned Patience sharply. "Thy father's wristbands will not be done the better for thy nonsense."

"Shall I be turned out of my bedroom?" resumed Anna.

"For a night, perchance. Thee canst go into thy father's. But the top of the house will be done first."

"Is the roof to be scrubbed?" went on Anna. "I don't know how Hester will hold on while she does it."

"Thee art in one of thy wilful humours this morning," responded Patience. "Art thee going to set me at defiance now thy father's back is turned?"

"Who said anything about setting thee at defiance?" asked Anna. "I should like to see Hester scrubbing the roof!"

"Thee hadst better behave thyself, Anna," was the retort of Patience. And Anna, in her lighthearted wilfulness, burst into a merry laugh.

Grace departed, and Hester came in: a quiet little body, of forty years, with dark hair and defective teeth. Patience, as good as her word, was up betimes the following morning, and had the house up betimes, to institute the ceremony. Their house contained the same accommodation as Mrs. Halliburton's, with this addition—that the garret in the Quaker's had been partitioned off into two chambers. Patience slept in one; Grace had occupied the other. The three bedrooms on the floor beneath were used, one by Mr. Lynn, one by Anna; the other was kept as a spare room, for any chance visitor; the "best room" it was usually called. The house belonged to Mr. Lynn. Formerly, both houses had belonged to him; but at the time of his loss he had sold the other to Mr. Ashley.

The ablutions were in full play. Hester, with a pail, mop, scrubbing-brush, and other essentials, was ensconced in the top chambers; Anna, ostensibly at her wristband stitching (but the work did not get on very fast), was singing to herself in an undertone in one of the parlours, the door safely shut; while Patience was exercising a general superintendence, giving an eye everywhere. Suddenly there echoed a loud noise, as of a fall, and a scream resounded throughout the house. It appeared to come from what they usually called the bedroom floor. Anna flew up the stairs, and Hester Dell flew down the upper ones. At the foot of the garret stairs, her head against the door of Anna's chamber, lay Patience and a heavy bed-pole. In attempting to carry the pole down from her room, she had somehow overbalanced herself, and fallen heavily.

"Is the house coming down?" Anna was beginning to say. But she stopped in consternation when she saw Patience. Hester attempted to pick her up.

"Thee cannot raise me, Hester. Anna, child, thee must not attempt to touch me. I fear my leg is br–"

Her voice died away, her eyes closed, and a hue, as of death, overspread her countenance. Anna, more terrified than she had ever been in her life, flew round to Mrs. Halliburton's.

Dobbs, from her kitchen, saw her coming—saw the young face streaming with tears, heard the short cries of alarm—and Dobbs stepped out.

"Why, what on earth's the matter now?" asked she.

Anna seized Dobbs, and clung to her; partly that to do so seemed some protection in her great terror. "Oh, Dobbs, come in to Patience!" she cried. "I think she's dying."

The voice reached the ears of Jane. She came forth from the parlour. Dobbs was then running in to Samuel Lynn's, and Jane ran also, understanding nothing.

Patience was reviving when they entered. All her cry was, that they must not move her. One of her legs was in some manner doubled under her, and doubled over the pole. Jane felt a conviction that it was broken.

"Who can run fastest?" she asked. "We must have Mr. Parry here."

Hester waited for no further instruction. She caught up her fawn-coloured Quaker shawl and grey bonnet, and was off, putting them on as she ran. Anna, sobbing wildly, turned and hid her face on Jane, as one who wants to be comforted. Then, her mood changing, she threw herself down beside Patience, the tears from her own eyes falling on Patience's face.

"Patience, dear Patience, canst thee forgive me? I have been wilful and naughty, but I never meant to cross thee really. I did it only to tease thee; but I loved thee all the while."

Patience, suffering as she was, drew down the repentant face to kiss it fervently. "I know it, dear child; I know thee. Don't thee distress thyself for me."

Mr. Parry came, and Patience was carried into the spare room. Her leg was broken, and badly broken; the surgeon called it a compound fracture.

So there was an end to the grand cleansing scheme for a long time to come! Patience lay in sickness and pain, and Hester had to make her her first care. Anna's spirits revived in a day or two. Mr. Parry said a cure would be effected in time; that the worst of the business was the long confinement for Patience; and Anna forgot her dutiful fit of repentance. Patience would be well again, would be about as before; and, as to the present confinement, Anna rather grew to look upon it as the interposition of some good fairy, who must have taken her own liberty under its special protection.

Whether Anna would have succeeded in eluding the vigilance of Patience up cannot be told; she certainly did that of Patience down. Anna had told Herbert Dare that he was not to pay a visit to Atterly's field again, or expect her to pay one; but Herbert Dare was about the last person to obey such advice. Had William Halliburton remained to be—as Herbert termed it—a treacherous spy, there's no doubt that Herbert would have striven to set his vigilance at defiance: with William's absence, the field, both literally and figuratively, was open to him. In the absence of Samuel Lynn, it was doubly open. Herbert Dare knew perfectly well that if the Quaker once gained the slightest inkling of his secret acquaintance with Anna, it would effectually be put a stop to. To wear a cloak resembling William Halliburton's, on his visits to the field, had been the result of a bright idea. It had suddenly occurred to Mr. Herbert that if the Quaker's lynx eyes did by mischance catch sight of the cloak, promenading some fine night at the back of his residence, they would accord it no particular notice, concluding the wearer to be William Halliburton taking a moonlight stroll at the back of his residence. Nevertheless, Herbert had timed his visits so as to make pretty sure that Samuel Lynn was out of view, safely ensconced in Mr. Ashley's manufactory; and he had generally succeeded. Not quite always, as the reader knows.

Anna was of a most persuadable nature. In defiance of her promise to William, she suffered Herbert Dare to persuade her again into the old system of meeting him. Guileless as a child, never giving thought to wrong or to harm—beyond the wrong and harm of thus clandestinely stealing out, and that wrong she conveniently ignored—she saw nothing very grave in doing it. Herbert could not come indoors; Patience would be sure not to welcome him; and therefore, she logically argued to her own mind, she must go out to him.

She had learnt to like Herbert Dare a great deal too well not to wish to meet him, to talk with him. Herbert, on his part, had learnt to like her. An hour passed in whispering to Anna, in mischievously untying her sober cap, and letting the curls fall, in laying his own hand fondly on the young head, and telling her he cared for her beyond every earthly thing. It had grown to be one of his most favourite recreations; and Herbert was not one to deny himself any recreation that he took a fancy to. He intended no harm to the pretty child. It is possible that, had any one seriously pointed out to him the harm that might arise to Anna, in the estimation of Helstonleigh, should these stolen meetings be found out, Herbert might for once have done violence to his inclinations, and not have persisted in them. Unfortunately—very unfortunately, as it was to turn out—there was no one to give this word of caution. Patience was ill, William was away: and no one else knew anything about it. In point of fact, Patience could not be said to know anything, for William's warning had not made the impression upon her that it ought to have done. Patience's confiding nature was in fault. For Anna deliberately to meet Herbert Dare or any other "Herbert" in secret, she would have deemed a simple impossibility. In the judgment of Patience, it had been nothing less than irredeemable sin.

What did Herbert Dare promise himself, in thus leading Anna into this imprudence? Herbert promised himself nothing—beyond the passing gratification of the hour. Herbert had never been one to give any care to the future, for himself or for any one else; and he was not likely to begin to do it at present. As to seeking Anna for his wife, such a thought had never crossed his mind. In the first place, at the rate the Dares—Herbert and his brothers—were going on, a wife for any of them seemed amongst the impossibilities. Unless, indeed, she made the bargain beforehand to live upon air; there was no chance of their having anything else to live upon. But, had Herbert been in a position, pecuniarily considered, to marry ten wives, Anna Lynn would not have been one of them. Agreeable as it might be to him to linger with Anna, he considered her far beneath himself; and pride, with Herbert, was always in the ascendant. Herbert had been introduced to Anna Lynn at Mrs. Ashley's, and that threw a sort of prestige around her. She was also enshrined in the respectable Quaker body of the town. But for these facts, for being who she was, Herbert might have been less scrupulous in his behaviour towards her. He would not—it may be as well to say he dared not—be otherwise than considerate towards Anna Lynn; but, on the other hand, he would not have considered her worthy to become his wife. On the part of Samuel Lynn, he would far rather have seen his child in her coffin, than the wife of Herbert Dare. The young Dares did not bear a good name in Helstonleigh.

In this most uncertain and unsatisfactory state of things, what on earth—as Dobbs had said to Anna—did Herbert want with her at all? Far, far better that he had allowed Anna to fall in with the sensible advice of William Halliburton—"Do not meet him again." It was a sad pity; and it is very probable that Herbert Dare regretted it afterwards, in the grievous misery it entailed. Misery to both; and without positive ill conduct on the part of either.

But that time has not yet come, and we are only at the stage of Samuel Lynn's absence and Patience's broken leg. Anna had taken to stealing out again; and her wits were at work to concoct a plausible excuse for her absences to Hester Dell, that no tales might be carried to Patience.

"Hester, Patience is a fidget. Thee must see that. She would like me to keep at my work all day, all day, evening too, and never have a breath of fresh air! She'd like me to shut myself up in this parlour, as she has now to be shut up in her room; never to be in the garden in the lovely twilight; never to run and look at the pretty lambs in the field; never to go next door, and say 'How dost thee?' to Jane Halliburton! It's a shame, Hester!"

"Well, I think it would be, if it were true," responded Hester, a simple woman in mind and language, who loved Anna almost as well as did Patience. "But dost thee not think thee art mistaken, child? Patience seems anxious that thee should go out. She says I am to take thee."

"I dare say!" responded Anna; "and leave her all alone! How would she come downstairs with her broken leg, if any one knocked at the door? She's a dreadful fidget, Hester. She'd like to watch me as a cat watches a mouse. Look at last night! It's all on account of these shirts. She thinks I shan't get them done. I shall."

"Why, dear, I think thee wilt," returned Hester, casting her eyes on the work. "Thee art getting on with them."

"I am getting on nicely. I have done all the stitching, and nearly the plain part of the bodies; I shall soon be at the gathers. What did she say to thee last night?"

"She said, 'Go to the parlour, Hester, and See whether Anna does not want a light.' And I came and could not find thee. And then she said thee wast always running into the next door, troubling them, and she would not have it done. Thee came in just at the time, and she scolded thee."

"Yes, she did," resentfully spoke Anna. "I tell thee, Hester, she's the worst fidget breathing. I give thee my word, Hester, that I had not been inside the Halliburtons' door. I had been in this garden and in the field. I had been close at work all day–"

"Not quite all day, dear," interrupted Hester, willing to smooth matters to the child as far as she was able. "Thee hadst thy friend Mary Ashley here to call in the morning, and thee hadst Sarah Dixon in the afternoon."

"Well, I had been at work a good part of the day," corrected Anna, "and I wanted some fresh air after it. Where's the crime?"

"Crime, dear! It's only natural. If I had not my errands to go upon, and so take the air that way, I should like myself to run to the field, when my work was done."

"So would any one else, except Patience," retorted Anna. "Hester, look thee. When she asks after me again, thee hast no need to tell her, should I have run out. It only fidgets her, and she is not well enough to be fidgeted. Thee tell her I am at my sewing. But I can't be sewing for ever, Hester; I must have a few minutes' holiday from it now and then. Patience might have cause to grumble if I ran away and left it in the day."

"Well, dear, I think it is only reasonable," slowly answered Hester, considering the matter over. "I'll not tell her thee art in the garden again; for she must be kept tranquil, friend Parry says."

"She was just as bad when I was a little girl, Hester," concluded Anna. "She wouldn't let me run in the garden alone then, for fear I should eat the gooseberries. But it is not the gooseberry season now."

"All quite true and reasonable," thought Hester Dell.

And so the young lady contrived to enjoy a fair share of evening liberty. Not but that she would have done with more, had she known how to get it. And as the weeks went on, and the cold weather of early spring merged into summer days, more genial nights, she and Herbert Dare grew bold in their immunity from discovery, and scarcely an evening passed but they might have been seen, had any one been on the watch, in Farmer Atterly's field. Anna had reached the point of taking his arm now; and there they would pace under cover of the hedge, Herbert talking, and Anna dreaming that she was in Eden.