John's Lily

CHAPTER V

MRS. ALFRICK

"O shame, O grief, when earth's rude toys,
An opening door, a breath, a noise,
Drive from the heart the eternal joys,
Displace the LORD of Love!"
                                                        —Lyra Innocentium

"I never heard such nonsense in my life!" said Mary's stepmother. She was standing, dressed in her best, in the rather untidy front kitchen of the farmhouse, where Mary was ironing some little pinafores. Her four younger children were playing about outside, swinging on the garden gate that opened into the steep lane leading to the village; finding what amusement they could till their mother was ready, rather to the peril of their Sunday clothes.

She was going to take them all to Carsham Fair. This grand event only happened once in three years. It was the finest pleasure fair in all the country round, and attracted crowds of people who hardly left their scattered villages and lonely commons between one fair and another.

Mrs. Alfrick was in high good humour. She had formerly lived nearer London, and often complained bitterly of the dulness of Markwood. She, like many other people of that neighbourhood, made those three-yearly fairs a date in her existence, counting up to them and down from them. This child or the other was born "a month afore last fair but one." Such an old man or woman in the village would never live to see next fair. It was just three months "afore last fair" that John Randal had picked up that child in the ditch. And it was "nigh on a year after last fair" that Mary had been such a silly as to promise to marry him.

More than two years ago that promise had been given. Mrs. Alfrick certainly did not wish to part with Mary, and would have grumbled heartily enough if John had found himself able to marry; but at the same time the delay, "wasting Polly's life," as she called it, made a fine text for her to preach upon when she wanted to tease the girl.

"No, I never did hear such nonsense!" she repeated; while Mary, who had been bustling about all the morning, helping her to get the work done, to dress the children and give them their early dinner, now bent gravely over her ironing-board, wishing the whole family would start off and leave her alone.

"There you are, thinking of nothing in the world but that child's pinners," Mrs. Alfrick went on, "while you might be going down to Carsham to enjoy yourself along with the lot of us. I do say it's a shame. If John was at home I shouldn't be surprised; but he's took a holiday and gone off to see his friends—just like his selfishness!—and left you to take care of his mother and that there foundling, as ought to have been sent to the workhouse long ago; and John, he ought to have done his duty and married you. It makes me downright sick to see the fuss you all make with that white-faced bit of a child. John thinks a sight more about her than he do about you, Polly, and you're a poor-spirited girl to stand it!"

Mary made no answer.

"There now, stupid, leave them pinners and come along. Your father'll be coming down presently, and he'd sooner see you there than not; and however am I to mind all the children by myself? It'll be the death of me. Come now, Polly, I'll wait for you ten minutes, that I will, with pleasure, and we'll call for Lily and take her down too. The children said she was crying 'cause she mightn't go. Mrs. Randal won't mind if she's with you, and serve John right, with his fidgets; he'll have to get over it. Come, Polly, you ain't bound to obey the fellow yet, any way."

"Now then," said Mary, suddenly standing upright with a very decided frown; "you know you're only wasting your breath. It's John's business whether Lily goes to the fair, and he told me to mind she didn't. So don't stop for me, if you please, for I ain't coming, and would rather stop away."

"Well, you might keep a civil tongue. I'm only speaking for your good," observed her stepmother. "Some day you'll know I'm right, when you're a bit tired of being that fellow's slave, and of seeing that conceited chit always put before you. Perhaps then you'll remember it was me as had to suffer, with all them children to look after, because you was that ill-natured and that selfish. Good morning to you."

She walked out of the house with an injured air. Mary was far too much used to her way of talking, however, to pay much attention. She called after her, "Look here! just tell Mrs. Randal as you pass that I've got the ironing to finish, and the house to clean up, and I'll be down as soon as ever I can."

Mrs. Alfrick did not condescend to turn her head or to make any answer. She called the children—the elder ones had gone on before—and they trooped off down the lane all together.

It seemed, however, as if her bark might be worse than her bite, for when she reached the blacksmith's cottage, she told the children to wait for her in the road, turned in at the little gate, and knocked at the door. It was opened by Lily.

The little girl was now, as far as they could guess, about six years old, for more than three years—it was now October—had passed by since that evening of summer storm when the old thorn roots had done their best to shelter her till she found a safer refuge in John's kind arms. She was a small, slight child, fair and delicate-looking, with beautiful, expressive blue eyes, hair still in the silky golden curls of early childhood, and a general air of grace and refinement that marked some difference, real or imaginary, between her and her companions at school and play. They all admired Lily and gave up to her; and if Mrs. Randal had not been firm as well as kind, this, with John's indulgence, might have been very bad for the child's character. But though she was self-willed and accustomed to take the lead, the home life of the cottage taught her to be unselfish, generous, and truthful. Lily had her faults, but they were not of a serious or a mean kind, and her loving little heart was quite devoted to John and his mother. Towards Mary she never, even now, showed much affection; the girl was undemonstrative and shy. But she took her as a matter of course, as something belonging to John, and therefore to be trusted, to be flown to in trouble, to be obeyed when necessary.

Mrs. Alfrick, when the door was opened, stared down rather in surprise at the slight little figure in the simple blue frock.

"Well, my dear, and where's mother?" she said slowly.

"Poor Mrs. Nash is very ill," the child answered in sweet tones, hardly spoilt by the accent of the county. "They came and fetched mother. She said I mustn't mind stopping alone for a bit, 'cause Polly was coming."

"Well, I never! Let's come in a minute, there's a good child," said Mrs. Alfrick, pushing the door, which Lily was holding open just wide enough to show her small self, and no more. "Well, I never! and so you're left all alone."

Mrs. Alfrick stood on the bright red tiles and looked round at the polished cleanliness, the exquisite order of everything in that little low room. She did not often pay a visit there, for there was not much love lost between John's home and Mary's. Her look now was one of both envy and admiration. "But how can one ever keep a thing clean with all them children about, and that girl Polly with half her heart down here?" she muttered, in answer to her own thoughts. Then she looked again at Lily, saw that the little face was not cheerful, that the eyes so wistfully lifted were not without traces of tears, and an idea came into her head.

"Serve 'em right, every one of 'em!"

Mrs. Alfrick had been a pretty woman in her time, and still possessed a certain attractiveness when she chose to smile and look pleasant.

"Mary ain't coming yet, my dear," she said; "she's got a lot o' work to do. I'd stop along of you myself, pretty, but I'm off to the fair with the children. There now; what's the matter now, what are you crying about, child?"

"I want to go to the fair," sobbed Lily; "I want to go with the other children."

"Well, to be sure!" murmured Mrs. Alfrick, smiling.

She sat down in the large red armchair, took Lily on her knee, and danced her about for a minute or two. She could not quite make up her mind, yet every moment the idea seemed more clever, the temptation more irresistible. It would be a fine trick to play on that disagreeable prig of a John Randal, a fine punishment for Mary, with her ill-natured ways. It could not hurt the child; she would be with the others all the time.

"Look here, Lily," she said, "would you like to go to the fair with me and Tommy and the rest of us?"

The child stopped crying and looked up. Then she shook her curls violently. "John said I wasn't to go."

"Oh, my dear, that was 'cause he was going away to see Mr. Bland, and there wasn't nobody to take you. Mother and Polly don't like fairs. But he couldn't have no objection to you going along of me."

"Couldn't he?" asked Lily, her eyes dilating joyfully.

"Of course he couldn't! There, run and get your hat and jacket; that nice clean frock'll do, you're such a good little girl, you keep so clean. Lizzie's and Louisa's frocks ain't fit to be seen an hour after they've put them on."

Lily had disappeared within the staircase door before this speech was finished. In two minutes she was down again in her Sunday hat and jacket, dancing impatiently on the floor in front of Mrs. Alfrick, who found the red chair very comfortable after a morning of bustle and fatigue, and was much amused by looking round at the possessions of John and his mother.

"Well, child, are you ready?" she said.

Lily came close to her and held up a little key.

"My locket, please," she said.

Mrs. Alfrick stared.

"My locket that I always wear on Sundays," cried the child, with an impatient jump.

Mrs. Alfrick had never heard of the locket which was round Lily's neck when John found her, and had never noticed the child on Sundays.

"Well, my dear, where is it?" she said.

Lily pointed to a small tin box on a high shelf. Mrs. Alfrick, with a sigh, uprooted herself from the comfortable armchair, climbed on another chair which Lily brought, and took down the box, partly moved by curiosity. There was the little gold locket lying in cotton wool, with a fresh piece of blue ribbon. It was soon tied round the little girl's neck.

"Did John give it you?" Mrs. Alfrick asked.

"Don't know. I've had it always. It's my locket," was the only explanation to be had from Lily. "Mother says I mustn't ever lose it."

A suspicion of the truth then flashed across Mrs. Alfrick's mind. It was not likely, certainly, that John could have afforded to buy Lily a locket which looked like real gold. It also occurred to her that Carsham Fair was not exactly the right place for a child with anything valuable tied round her neck. But these considerations did not trouble her much.

"Serve 'em right for being so close. They never told me as the child had a locket."

She took Lily's hand and hurried her out of the house. The other children were waiting impatiently, and the whole party were soon far on their way to Carsham. Mrs. Nash, the sick neighbour to whose house Mrs. Randal had gone, lived near the church at the other end of the village. Mrs. Alfrick assured herself she could not spare the time to go fussing back there. And John was safe away at Moreton with Mr. Bland; he had gone the night before, for no work was ever done on Carsham Fair-day, and he had not had a holiday since that week in London, more than three years before.

It was about an hour later that Mary, having finished her ironing, tidied the house, and seen her father off to the fair, started down the lane with Lily's pinafores folded under her arm. The village when she reached it was very quiet, strangely quiet it seemed to her, till she remembered that by this time nearly everybody in Markwood was on the way to Carsham. But this did not account for the utter stillness that reigned in the blacksmith's little yard, and in the garden, bright with autumn flowers, where Lily was so fond of playing. Mary looked round her almost anxiously, as she turned in at the gate. Even then she felt by instinct that the house was empty, and even then a quite unreasonable feeling of alarm laid hold upon her as she slowly, hesitatingly, laid her hand on the latch of the door.

The kitchen, of course, was empty; so was the tiny parlour beyond, where a few Gloire de Dijon roses were still looking in at the window. Mary laid down her parcel and went to the staircase door, opening it, looking up into the darkness, calling once or twice, "Mrs. Randal, are you there? Lily!" But no voice answered.

With a vague fear that something dreadful might have happened, the girl ran softly upstairs; but the rooms were empty. She hurried down again and went out into the garden: it was possible that Mrs. Randal or Lily might be at the far end, behind the apple-trees. No; the garden too was empty; and she came slowly back down the pathway, puzzled, frightened, yet hardly knowing why. Mrs. Randal might have gone to see a neighbour; in that case she had no doubt taken the child with her. But it was not like her to go out when John was away; and it was still more unlike her careful ways to leave her house open. Mary remembered, however, that Mrs. Randal was expecting her that afternoon, and probably a good deal sooner than she had been able to come. Of course that was why she had left the door open.

Before going out to look for her, Mary glanced once more into the kitchen. Then she noticed Lily's everyday hat on a chair, her pinafore thrown on the floor, and also, most startling of all, the tin box where her locket was kept standing open and empty on the table.

"But wherever are they gone?" said Mary to herself. "Not to Carsham, surely!"

She went out into the road, looking up and down with wondering eyes. Hardly anybody was in sight; one or two men coming home early from their work to have their tea and be off to the fair; and one old woman, whom the village generally considered almost half-witted, leaning on a stick as she came hobbling past the forge. It was possible that she might know something, for she wandered about the village all day long, and took a deep, sometimes a mischievous interest in the affairs of her neighbours. Mary came out of Mrs. Randal's gate just as old Mrs. Pierce—Granny Pierce as they called her—was passing.

"Well, when I was as young as you," said the old woman, shaking her head at Mary, "I used to say as I'd dance at the fair so long as I'd a leg to stand on. But these young folks they're all in the dumps and doldrums. Well, what are ye looking at me like that for?"

"Nothing, Granny," the girl answered quietly. "I was just wondering if you'd seen Mrs. Randal and Lily. I can't make out where they've gone."

"Jane Randal ain't gone to the fair, she's not that sort, more's the pity," said Granny Pierce. "No more's your John. When be you two going to get married?"

"Oh, I don't know. Have you seen Mrs. Randal and the child? Tell me if you have, there's a good soul," said Mary.

"Yes, my dear, I'll tell you, 'cause you always, speaks civil-like to a poor old woman. They fetched Mrs. Randal more nor an hour since to Sally Nash what's got the high strikes. Seems as nobody else could keep her quiet. She'll go off in one o' them fits, you see if she don't, and a good job too, a poor measling thing. When you hears of it, my dear, you say Granny Pierce told you."

"But then, Mrs. Randal never took Lily with her there!"

"Not she, to be sure. Lily's off to the fair. She's sent her along of your stepmother and the children."

"Nonsense!"

"She did though. I'm old, it's true, and weak in my legs, but I ain't blind. I seed 'em all going off together, and that child running hand in hand with yer little brothers. All dressed smart for Sunday she was, with that there blue and white hat as you trimmed yourself. Well now, ain't you got a copper or two in your pocket, Mary Alfrick, for a poor old woman as has told you all them news?"

"Oh, I can't stop now, Granny," said Mary.

The old woman stood and looked after her, growling remarks that were not complimentary, as Mary started off to run. In another minute she was out of sight, for she had turned up the lane to the farm.

Ten minutes later Mary, in her turn, having hurried on the good clothes in which she felt bound to appear outside her own village, was walking at her fastest pace, sometimes breaking into a run, on the way to Carsham.

Fond as she was of Mrs. Randal, she now felt, for John's sake, really angry with her. When John had said that the child was not to go to the fair! And if Lily had over-persuaded her into letting her go, the idea of trusting her to Mrs. Alfrick, who was hardly capable of taking care of her own children, and certainly not of specially watching over a child of remarkable appearance, like Lily! And the locket, too! The treasure which only came out on Sundays, when either John or his mother always took the child to church themselves, and did not allow her to play with the others. It really looked as if the summons to poor Mrs. Nash in hysterics had deprived Mrs. Randal of her senses. What would John say?

Mary's one idea was to hurry to Carsham, to find Lily and bring her home. She was a delicate child and would soon be tired; the shows, the noise, the disorder and roughness of the fair were more likely to frighten than to amuse her, and Mary knew very well that her own relations would stay as late as they could, very much later than was right or wise, either for themselves or the children.

It was a quiet, cloudy afternoon; the beautiful woods, the tall trees that sheltered the road, were beginning to show the bronze tints of autumn; the old thorns, one of which had been Lily's cradle, were crimson with fruit. But Mary saw nothing as she hurried along the road, and took no notice of the traps full of noisy people that passed her, or the groups of walkers that she easily outstripped. There was a weight at her heart, though her feet seemed to have wings. Some great coming trouble whispered to her in the low wind that now and then rustled the leaves, hung over her in the darkening clouds. John's little darling! And almost the last words he had said to her were, "You'll look after Lily."

In the meanwhile, when Mrs. Randal was able to leave the poor patient a little calmer, and to make her way home, tired and longing for her tea, sure of finding it ready, and of seeing Mary and Lily's face full of welcome at the door, she only found a silent empty house where the fire had gone out, and she looked round in amazement, as Mary had done, on Lily's hat and pinafore and the open tin box. Where were they? What had happened? Mary had been there, evidently, for Lily's pinafores that she had taken to iron lay in a heap on the table. It was certainly very strange. Poor Mrs. Randal turned pale and pressed her hand to her heart. She was both bewildered and frightened. The house door open! Well, of course, Mary might have been obliged to go out somewhere on her own business. She might have run up home, and taken Lily with her, perhaps to see to the milk, if her father could not trust his man. But then it was so queer that she should have let the fire go out—and why should Lily have put on her best hat and her locket? It flashed into Mrs. Randal's mind that perhaps Lily's own relations had come and carried her off suddenly. And John away! But Mary—where was Mary?

She opened the door and went out into the yard. To her too the day seemed to have darkened, and a cold presentiment of misfortune touched her as if with an icy hand. Outside the railings Granny Pierce came hobbling along in her shabby cloak, wild grey locks escaping under her old sun-bonnet. No one else seemed to be astir in the quiet village street: everybody now was gone to the fair.

"Good afternoon, Granny," said Mrs. Randal, in her kind voice. "Have you seen my little girl or Mary Alfrick?"

"They be never gone without your knowledge, be they?" said the old woman.

"What do you mean?" asked Mrs. Randal, a faint flush rising in her pale face. "Gone where?"

"To Carsham Fair, to be sure. They're young, and it's the right place for 'em. When I was a girl," said the old woman with a chuckle, "I used to say as I'd dance at the fair as long as I'd a leg to stand on. Don't you tie up the young uns too tight, Jane Randal, or they'll give ye the slip one o' these days."

"You don't tell me as Mary Alfrick's taken Lily to the fair? She never would. You're talking nonsense, Granny, come!"

"I may and I mayn't," said Granny, with a cunning look. "What did you ask me for, if you didn't want to know?"

"It's impossible."

"You just listen to me. Never you trust them quiet ones. They's the worst of all. There never was a girl yet——"

"But did you see them going?"

"To be sure I did. And the little un with that sweet pretty hat on, all blue and white ribbons, as your John paid a nice penny for, I daresay."

Mrs. Randal stood quite still. The old woman watched her with half-mocking eyes. She had revenged herself on Mary, anyhow, for taking no notice of her request for a copper. Now she was thinking how some useful present might be extracted from Mrs. Randal.

But suddenly, much to her disappointment, Mrs. Randal turned back into her empty house and shut the door.

She set patiently to work to light up the fire, saying to herself, "What am I doing, to mind what that poor foolish old body says? If Polly has taken the child, Polly'll bring her back again. I'd best be quiet and get me some tea, and keep the kettle boiling against they come in. Polly won't be long, specially with John away. She'll know I'm anxious."

Nearly three hours later, when it was dusk, John lifted the latch and came in. His mother, still sitting solitary by the fire, started up to meet him.

"Why, mother—where's Lily?" were the first words he said.

CHAPTER VI

AT THE FAIR

"For a Crowd is not Company."—Bacon's Essays.

The High Street of Carsham, generally so quiet and deserted, was crowded and noisy enough that day. The wide space in front of the old market-place was filled up with swinging boats and merry-go-rounds, and rows of booths ran down each side of the wide street next the pavement. A field between the street and the river was occupied by shows—a wild-beast show, a theatre, a shooting-gallery, and all the various amusements that attracted the country people who stood staring in groups, or wandered slowly in and out of one tent or another. Every hour the crowd went on slowly increasing, the noise and life of the fair strengthening. A band was playing in the street, and music was also going on in hot and stuffy dancing-saloons at the back of several public-houses. These were doing a fine trade.

Altogether it seemed that Carsham and its neighbourhood was determined to have a day of thorough enjoyment, to spend as much money as could be scraped together. It was an opportunity that only came once in three years, and people were determined to make the best of it. Whole families flowed in from quiet villages and lonely commons; old and young, on foot or on wheels, they kept on coming; and this would go on till late in the evening, till the fair, which had always a few London roughs mingled with its crowd, was neither a safe nor respectable place for quiet people.

But there was not much rowdyism to be seen in the afternoon, when Mary walked in from Markwood; the amusements in the street were harmless enough; the gay booths were crowded with women and children, many of whom she knew, busily buying all manner of rubbish. The crowd was dressed in its Sunday clothes, and only now and then some rough lads with their horse-play disturbed its generally quiet enjoyment. The scene was lively enough, and noisy enough; but the noise was harmless. Mary met with no pushing or rudeness of any kind as she made her way along the street, and her eyes were attracted by many sights that amused them; but she did not stop to look at anything or buy anything. She could not be happy till Lily's hand was in hers. Then she thought she would buy the child a fairing, and would insist on her coming home at once. They would be at home long before John was; and he could hardly be angry with his mother for letting the child go. Though the more Mary thought of that the more astonished she felt that Mrs. Randal should have done it. A particular person like her! it seemed unnatural.

Mary suddenly stood still in front of a toy-stall, at which she appeared to stare with the deepest interest. But in reality she saw nothing; it was a new thought that had stopped her. Was it possible that Lily had been left alone in the house for a few minutes, and had dressed herself and run away to join the other children? She wanted to go to the fair, Mary knew; she had been crying about it the day before. And it was very possible that, if she had done it, Mrs. Alfrick would not have taken the trouble to send her back. The fact of her wearing the locket seemed to make this a reasonable idea, for Mrs. Randal was even less likely to send the locket, the one means of identifying Lily, than to send the child herself.

"Well, she is a naughty little thing!" said Mary to herself. "And John won't have her punished. Well, I do sometimes wish that child was back where she came from."

Here Mary was roused by the keeper of the toy-stall, who began bringing forward her best goods to tempt such a respectable-looking purchaser, and seemed a good deal injured when she shook her head and walked away.

She went on to the very end of the street, looking eagerly about among the women and children that crowded her path, but nowhere did she see the Alfrick children, or their mother, or Lily. They were not in the boats, or on the merry-go-rounds, they were not standing about listening to the band near the market-place, they were not to be seen among the ever-thickening crowd that made its way slowly along the line of booths. Mary began to feel lonely, as well as anxious. Some of the ruder people, the strangers, stared at her, and she felt that Carsham Fair was hardly the place for a girl of her age to be wandering about alone. Her presence there would not please John, she knew, any more than Lily's—and if he could see her there alone, he would certainly be angry. However, Mary had not time to think much of this. She must find Lily—that was her first work, her first duty; and then they would both turn their backs on Carsham Fair quickly enough—gladly enough too, as far as she was concerned, for she had seldom felt more anxious or more miserable.

She began to think that Mrs. Alfrick must have taken the children into one of the shows. Making her way slowly back down the street, towards the part of the town where these were, she now met a few neighbours from Markwood, who stared and grinned at the sight of her. Was this Miss Mary Alfrick, who generally treated common amusements with scorn? Mary stopped in spite of their looks, and asked if they had seen any of her people. "No." One woman had noticed Farmer Alfrick going into the Wheatsheaf Inn; but there was nobody else with him.

"Anything wrong at home, as you want him back in a hurry?" asked another.

"No, thank you," Mary answered civilly. "But they're all here, Mrs. Alfrick and the children and all—and I wanted to find them."

She went on down the street, instantly losing these acquaintances in the crowd.

"Her young man had ought to be with her," said one of the women; but then they stopped in front of one of those fascinating booths, and forgot all about Mary.

She stood about for some time at the gate of the field where the wild-beast show, the theatre, and other attractions were set up. It was not a nice place for waiting; there were a good many unpleasant-looking people about, and a little way down the lane there was an old and not very respectable public-house, much patronised at these times by the roughs and tramps who came from London. For some time Mary stood looking down the lane towards this house, which was actually hidden from her, however, by two great chestnut trees that had not yet lost the orange masses of their leaves. Music, though only of a barrel-organ, was going on merrily; there were shouts of laughter now and then, and sounds as of people dancing on the other side of the trees.

Mary saw and listened to all this without realising it much. She was trying to make up her mind to go inside one of these shows after another in search of Mrs. Alfrick and the children. It did occur to her that she might follow her father to the Wheatsheaf and ask for his help. But she shrank with a sort of pride and disgust from facing him and his companions there. He was likely enough to answer her rudely. And after all, the rest of the party could not be very far off; they must be somewhere in the fair. Mary tried to persuade herself that it would be all right—and still she was miserable.

The afternoon was closing in fast, too; it would soon begin to get dusk; she must have been standing about Carsham more than an hour already, and now another half-hour was soon wasted, while she waited about the entrance of the shows. She was just making up her mind to venture inside the wild-beast show—they might be there—though the roars and growls to be heard were more likely to frighten children than to attract them—when suddenly a crowd of people came pouring out of a large tent, the entrance of which was ornamented with a terrifying picture of an immense black man with an axe, and an announcement that The Black Giant, a drama in three acts, would be performed twice that day.

In another moment Mary had rushed among these people and seized her stepmother by the arm. Three or four children were clinging to her, but Lily was not among them; a moment's glance showed Mary that.

"Mother, where's Lily?" she cried. "You've left her in the tent! Come along back and fetch her. I expect they won't let me go in."

Mrs. Alfrick was flushed, tired, and extremely cross.

"Plague take the girl!" she exclaimed. "So you've come after all! You might as well have stopped away. Nothing but Lily, Lily, from morning till night—I'm out of patience, and no wonder. Lily ain't a baby in arms, and I've got my own children to think of first—and as for that John of yours as picked her up in the ditch, he'd better stop at home and look after her, and you may just go and tell him so."

Mary turned white. She held Mrs. Alfrick's arm fast, and drew her to one side, while the other people hurried on to the gate.

"Look here," she said in a low voice. "Tell me this moment—what have you done with that child?"

"She's a naughty girl, Lily is," protested Mrs. Alfrick, while the other children began to cry; they found no enjoyment in a quarrel between Mary and their mother, for Mary's crimes were usually visited on them. "I gave her buns and sweets just like my own—I told her to come along with them and we'd all enjoy ourselves together."

"Where is she?"

"I paid a penny for her to go into that there theatre along of us—and it's more than many would have done for a brat like her—and we hadn't been there a quarter of an hour when she begins to cry and say she's frightened, just because there was a few murders on the stage—like there always is, you know. Well, I couldn't have her making a disturbance in there—they'd have turned out the lot of us in no time—so I just sent her along out with Lizzie, and told 'em both they was to stop about the gate till we come. Lizzie's a good girl and does as she's bid. She was pleased to go out with Lily; you know what a fuss she always makes of her."

"But where are they now?"

"Do just stop your noise, Mary. Ain't I telling you? They're somewhere outside here, waiting for us. I won't deny as that performance was longer than I expected—but don't you worrit now. They're as right as they can be."

"I hope so," said Mary grimly. "But all I can say is, I've been waiting about here for you half-an-hour or more, and I've seen nothing of them."

"Oh, it was longer ago than half-an-hour," said Mrs. Alfrick. "They've got back to the stalls and the music. Lily wanted to stop by the music before."

"Lily ought never to have come here at all, that's where it is," said Mary. "You don't mean to tell me Mrs. Randal sent her?"

She would hardly have confessed it, but she was rather more at ease now. Lizzie Alfrick was a steady child of nine years old, the best of the family. She would indeed, with a better bringing up, have been a nice little girl; but Mrs. Alfrick's system of alternate spoiling and knocking about was not likely to improve any character.

Mary had no satisfactory answer to her question.

"Well, and if she did," said Mrs. Alfrick, "it's no business of yours, as I can see. You ain't married to John yet. When you are, take my word for it, you'll have a bigger dose of Lily than you care for. Him and his mother, they're both right down silly over that child."

Mary knew her stepmother too well to go on asking questions. After all, it did not much matter how Lily got there. The next thing was to find the two children, who had evidently strayed away and lost themselves in the fair. This was not an easy business, for the crowd had thickened very much since Mary first came, and the advancing dusk, and the lights which were beginning to glimmer everywhere, made it extremely difficult to find anybody.

Mary set out to make her way along that crowded street once more. It was becoming like a bad dream, this perpetual hurrying up and down through the noisy fair, her ears and brain bewildered by the sound of voices, of music, or the discordant shriek of penny trumpets. She pushed along through the people. There were plenty of children wedged in among those groups that surrounded the lighted booths, but nowhere could she find either of the children she was looking for. She soon, being active and not encumbered with clinging hands, had left Mrs. Alfrick and her family some distance behind, and was working her way desperately through those stationary crowds. Flushed with trouble and fatigue, no summer night could have seemed to her more exhausting. The heavy air of that street weighed on her as if it had been a close and suffocating room, though some of the people were shivering, and a cold little October wind was whistling along, shaking the tents and making the lights flicker wildly.

"It's going to rain," said a voice. "It always do rain on Carsham Fair."

Mary searched to the end of the street, and round the market-place, without success. Then she turned back, and after a little while met her stepmother and the children. Mrs. Alfrick was crying now, and telling one or two sympathisers in the crowd that she had lost her little girl, that Lizzie had been led away into mischief by the worst child in the village, a nasty good-for-nothing who had been picked up in a ditch.

"I've heard tell of that child," said one of the women near. "It was John Randal, the blacksmith over at Markwood, weren't it? He was a soft, not to send the child to the Union."

"I wish to goodness he had," said Mrs. Alfrick, with a deep sigh.

At that moment Mary pushed her way through the crowd to her stepmother's side.

"It's no good," she said. "I've looked in every corner. We must fetch father out of the Wheatsheaf and have a proper search made. There's bad characters about, and those children may have been stolen. We must go to the police."

"Fetch your father out of the Wheatsheaf! You may do it yourself, then!" cried Mrs. Alfrick, sobbing again, while several of the bystanders laughed.

Mary hesitated. She knew it was too true that her father, after a couple of hours at the Wheatsheaf, at fair-time too, was not likely to come out in a state to give any reasonable help. Every moment the curtain of dusk seemed to descend lower and lower above that flaring street; the shadows, the dark corners, the crowd that thickened perpetually—all made it harder from moment to moment to find what was lost. And yet—"They must be found!" said Mary to herself: though she wondered how long her brain would bear the bewilderment, the pushing, the noise and clamour in which this search had to be carried on.

If she could only see or speak to some respectable person with a grain of feeling and sense! But alas! as a rule, such persons were not to be met with at Carsham Fair.

As she looked round with distracted eyes, there was a sudden movement in the little crowd that surrounded them, and Lizzie Alfrick broke through and rushed to her mother, burying her face in her gown.

Mary's joyful exclamation was checked upon her lips. For the child was alone and crying bitterly; there was no sign of Lily; and then a terror seized on Mary, compared with which her former anxiety had been nothing. Now, for the first time, she had to think of John's treasure, John's Lily, really alone, deserted and lost in the fair.

For a minute the confusion was too great; Mrs. Alfrick's sobs and scoldings, Lizzie's screams, the loud chatter of the people standing by—Mary could do nothing in the midst of all this. But presently she took Lizzie's hand and pulled her away from her mother.

"There, stop that noise," she said impatiently. "Be a good girl and tell me where Lily is."

"I don't know," said Lizzie, looking solemnly up into her face. "We lost each other. We was dancing to the organ over there, and it got so dark, and a man brought a lantern, and then I couldn't see a bit; and I went dancing round the trees and come back again, and Lily was gone, and then I couldn't find mother; and I went back to the house and they drove me out and telled me not to come bothering there. I thought I was lost too."

"But why were you such naughty children as not to stop where mother told you till she came out? If you had, I should have seen you there," said Mary.

"We didn't go far off. Only as far as them big trees, Polly. We went and picked up chestnuts—and then there was a man playing the organ and some children dancing, and we came and danced too. There was a woman too, and she brought Lily a stick of candy and said she was the prettiest little girl she ever saw in her life. Lily gave me half."

"Who was the woman? Did she belong to the house down there—the Travellers' Joy?"

"I don't think so," Lizzie said vaguely. "I didn't see her when I went back."

Mary stood still and thought for a moment. Somehow, all her distraction and bewilderment were gone. In spite of all the deafening confusion, her head was now clear.

"We must go to the Travellers' Joy and inquire there," she said to Mrs. Alfrick.

"Go where you please," was the answer. "I ain't coming. Lily ain't my child, and I won't be plagued with her any longer. She's up to some mischief, I'll be bound. You'll find her dancing in front o' that organ and getting more sticks of candy."

Mary turned away, only saying—"If you won't come with me, take my advice and go home with the children. It's nearly dark now. Lizzie can come with me; she may be a help, and I'll take care of her."

"She shan't then," cried the mother. "When I've just lost her and found her again! I always did say you was the most selfish girl living."

"Very well. Stay with your mother."

Mary let the little girl's hand go, and in another moment was alone in the crowd.

Without much difficulty, now that she knew where she must go, she made her way to the end of the street, turning down past the meadow where the shows were. The crowd was not so thick here, but it was very unpleasant in the gathering dusk. Under the chestnut-trees it was nearly dark; no playing or dancing was going on there now, but the windows of the old inn beyond were lit up brilliantly, and a great noise of stamping and shouting was to be heard from within. Mary knew that it was not a place for a girl like herself, but without hesitation she went straight to the open door, and asked a rough-looking woman who was crossing the passage if she had seen a pretty little girl with fair hair. She was answered by a torrent of bad language that drove her away from the door, her face burning with indignation and horror.

For a long time she waited about, as near as she dared, watching everybody who went in or came out. Something in the woman's look and manner, though she seemed to be anything but sober, made her suspect that she had seen Lily, that she knew where she was.

Mary was almost in despair. She thought, as she moved restlessly round and round in the darkness under the great trees, for a time which seemed to her quite awful in its length and hopelessness, that there must be respectable people in Carsham who would help her if she could get hold of them—police if she knew where to find them—a clergyman's house, if she could venture to apply to a total stranger. Mary was a shy, reserved girl, and had lived all her life at lonely Markwood—but now she would have had courage to do anything, if she had only known what to do. In the meanwhile, it grew darker every moment; the autumn night, black and starless, was settling down on Carsham Fair.

CHAPTER VII

IN THE DARK

"I stood alone (as some forsaken lamb
Goes bleating up the moors in weary dearth)
Crying, 'Where are ye, O my loved and loving?'"
                                                                        —E. B. BROWNING.

John Randal did not wait for much explanation from his mother. In truth, she had little to give him. It was impossible for her to imagine where Mary and the child were gone, unless to the fair. Why, in any case, should Lily have been dressed in her Sunday clothes? And though Mrs. Randal agreed heartily with John when he said—"But Polly never would take her there!" yet the moment after she was shaking her head and sighing over the certainty that, for some unknown reason, this was what Polly had done. Poor old Granny Pierce had no object to gain by telling a lie about it, as far as she could see. "No, John dear—Polly never would!" said Mrs. Randal. "But then you know, if she did, of course she meant to bring her home before dark. The child got round her, I expect. She did want to go, Lily did. It seemed a bit hard, with all the other children going. If you'd been at home, John, maybe you would have taken her yourself, just for an hour or so. Don't vex yourself over it too much. They'll be in soon, anyhow."

John's face grew sterner and graver every moment.

"No, mother, I should never have taken her. What's the good of leading a child like that into low sights and low company! I could never have believed it of Mary. Why, only yesterday, when I said good-bye before I started, she says to me that all her family was going to the fair, and that she was coming down to tea with you and Lily. Ay, says I, that's right, and mind Lily don't get away with the others—for that child is like quicksilver, I said, there's no holding her; she flies here and there like a little winged spirit. And Mary, she says, Never you trouble, John, she is safe with your mother and me. Well, I'm vexed with Mary, that's the truth, and I'm bound to tell her so."

John turned to take up his hat and stick.

"You'll stop and have some tea, my dear?" said his mother. "The kettle's boiling."

"No, mother, I can't swallow my tea. They ought to have been in long before this," said John. "I'm going straight off to look for them. Ay, and I'll take the lantern; for it'll be as black as a wolf's mouth in an hour."

"Don't you be hard on Polly, John," his mother called after him as he went out into the dusk. "Maybe she'd some good reason."

"We'll settle it between us," John answered, and the yard gate shut sharply behind him.

On the darkening road it was not long before he met a few of the more respectable Markwood people, coming back from the fair. He stopped the first of these and asked rather stiffly if they had seen any of the Alfricks. One woman said she had seen Mary, rather distracted like, searching about for her mother and the children.

"Did you happen to see if our Lily was with her?"

"No, I didn't see her—I should say she wasn't."

John marched on with great strides. Half-way to Carsham he met Mrs. Alfrick and her children dragging wearily along the road, the younger ones crying, cross and tired. The dusk was drawing in so fast now that John's tall figure towered beside them almost before they knew that he was near.

"Oh I say, John, you did make my heart beat!" cried Mrs. Alfrick, and then, fearful of blame to herself, she began to pour out a torrent of confused words about stupid girls and tiresome children, and how she was that moithered she didn't know which way to turn, and she was sure it was not her fault, and if Mary had behaved like a sensible girl from the beginning this trouble wouldn't have come upon them.

"Where is Mary now, Mrs. Alfrick? Where have you left her?"

John's voice was loud and angry.

"I ain't accustomed to be spoke to in that style, young man," said Mrs. Alfrick. "Ask a civil question, and you may get a civil answer. Well, I wasn't likely to stop there all night, was I, with all these children—and Polly wasn't likely to come off and leave her precious treasure there alone?"

"She's got Lily with her, then! what on earth are they doing there at this time of night?"

"Well, John, it's the shortest way to tell the truth. Lily's got lost in the fair somehow, and Polly's looking for her. I couldn't do no good, you know, with all these brats to look after."

"He's gone, mother!" said little Lizzie Alfrick, pulling her mother's gown. "But he didn't ought to be angry with Polly, 'cause it wasn't her fault that Lily got lost."

"You hold your noise, and don't correct your betters," replied Mrs. Alfrick. "He may be angry with who he likes, for all I care, and if you go chattering I'll knock your head up the chimney as soon as we get home."

Before John reached Carsham it was so dark under Sir Henry Smith's large trees that he lighted his lantern, being afraid of missing Mary by the way. Long before he entered the town, he could hear the discordant noises and see the flashing lights of the fair. At the near end of the bridge his hurried steps were suddenly checked by Mary's rushing up to him and clasping her two hands round his arm.

"O John!" she said in a low voice, which trembled on the edge of a sob. "Oh, some good angel's brought you! Have you heard? have you met mother? what shall we do?"

"I've heard that you have lost Lily—that's what I've heard! Took her to Carsham Fair and lost her—that's enough bad news for one day," said John. "You, as I trusted like myself! You took Lily to the fair and lost her, while I was away."

The flush in Mary's tired face faded to a deadly paleness as John spoke. He lifted his lantern and looked at her; the poor girl gazed back at him with a bewildered horror that he did not in the least understand. For a moment she felt as if she must faint; her hand leaned heavily on his arm, and his voice as he went on speaking seemed far off, mingled with the rushing of some distant sea.

"You understand? you've deceived me—you've broke my heart—I shall never trust in you again. And coming home without her, were you? Well, go on then. Take the lantern, for you can't see. Tell my mother I'm not coming back till I've found the child."

Mary's lips moved. "Wait a minute, John!" she tried to say, but could not utter a sound.

He shook his arm free from her detaining hand, and tried to give her the lantern. Its light flickered up and down, on the great boughs of the trees that stretched overhead, on his dark face, pale and stern, in a white heat of anger such as Mary had never seen there before, certainly never with herself for its object.

"Stop—let me tell you," she began, with a violent effort. "You oughtn't to speak to me like that——"

"Speak to you! I don't want to speak to you at all. I wish I had never trusted you—but it's the last time!"

"Very well," Mary said. Somehow, his extreme anger, which altered his voice, making it hoarse and shaky, so that she would hardly have known it, had the effect of raising anger and pride in her too. He was so utterly unjust, if he only knew it; and he would not let her speak to tell him. This was not a man to make a girl happy. She stepped back from him into the road; he still held the lantern in a hand that trembled.

"Very well; let it be the last time," said the girl. "That's my wish as much as yours. The place where Lily got lost is under the big trees outside the Travellers' Joy. My belief is, she's inside that house now, but the woman abused me and wouldn't answer nor let me go in. That's all I can tell you. Good night."

Her voice was as hard and cold as John's was angry.

"What am I stopping here for then?" he exclaimed. "Here, take the lantern—and whatever possessed you to take that child anywhere near the Travellers' Joy, or to go near it yourself! It's little better than a den of thieves."

"Ah—well, you see you didn't know what a wicked girl I was," said Mary bitterly; and then she laughed.

John stared at her for a moment; he could hardly believe his ears. She suddenly took the lantern from his hand, and started off on her way home; the next instant he was half across the bridge hurrying into the town.

Mary went straight back to the farm, and reached it safely, having overtaken her stepmother and the children in the lane. She would not answer a single question, only saying that she had met John, and he was gone to look for Lily. The look in her face gave Mrs. Alfrick some secret anxiety; she suspected that the two had quarrelled, and knew very well that it was all her doing.

"Well, serve him right! only they're sure to make it up again, worse luck! She's too good for him, as her father always said—an ignorant, stuck-up fellow!"

In the meanwhile, in the gathering darkness of that evening, a small covered cart was slowly climbing the long slope of Dog Down.

A man and woman walked by the side of the horse and talked together in low tones. In the cart a child was tied to the seat, muffled in shawls and handkerchiefs, so that Lily in her bright fairness could hardly have been recognised. She was terribly frightened, poor little girl; she was moaning to herself, crying out for John, yet afraid to cry loudly, for the woman, after petting and cajoling her at first, had threatened to beat her within an inch of her life if she made any noise.

It had all been very puzzling, and Lily could not understand it. She had very vague ideas of her own past life, but she had a notion, half from memory, half from the talk of other children, that Mrs. Randal was not really her mother, nor John her brother; that she had been found somehow and brought home—to the home which she loved and never wished to leave again. And now this woman, who came out of the public-house with smiles and admiring words and sticks of candy, and kissed her, and looked wonderfully pleased to see her, had enticed her into the house "just for a minute," and the man who was playing the organ had followed with a very unpleasant grin on his pale face, and they looked at Lily's locket, and said to each other, "It's her sure enough! Well, this is a piece of luck!" And the woman had looked hurriedly at her other clothes, and kissed her again, and told her she was a sweet child and her poor mother had found her again, and now she would come along with them, wouldn't she? and they would show her no end of pretty things, and she should have a new frock and a necklace and lots of barley-sugar, and dance to the organ as much as ever she liked. But by this time Lily had become alarmed and dissatisfied. She did not like the woman's red face, and shrank away from her kisses; as for the man, he looked ugly and cruel, and she was frightened. She cried and stamped her foot, and said, "No, you ain't my mother. I want to go back to my mother—I want to go back to John."

"Make yourself easy, pretty one," said the man. "I don't know who John may be, but he's no business with you. And as for your mother, she's a long distance off."

"There—didn't I tell you it was me?" said the woman.

"You won't get her to believe that in a hurry," he said, with a hoarse laugh.

Then they agreed it was best to start as soon as possible, before any friends the child might have should begin a search for her; and so they changed their tone, silencing her with rough threats, and wrapped her up and smuggled her away under the tilt of the cart, unknown even to the people of the Travellers' Joy.

The poor little horse toiled dismally up the long slippery hill, while the two from whose hands John had first rescued Lily walked together at his head and talked over their recovered prize. At last the reward that had long ago been offered for the lost child seemed to be really within their grasp. They could claim it now with an open face, for this time it could not be said that they had stolen the child.

"'Twas a lucky thought of yours, going down to that fair," said the woman to her husband. "As to me, I never expected to see her again. I couldn't believe my eyes when she came dancing round the tree with that very same locket round her neck, and looking just the same, only a bit bigger. They're good people as has taken care of her all this time. They might as likely as not have sent her to the Union. I wonder what their name is. There's a John as she talks about like as if he was a big boy."

"We won't make inquiries about John," said the man. "He'd maybe put in a claim for half the reward. Well, that's a queer part of the country, where they never hears nothing. But don't you go boasting too much. We should have been rich folks three years ago, if you hadn't made a fool of yourself. Just because I sent you and her down to lie quiet in one o' them lonely villages for a bit, till I could find out how the land lay, you must needs be so careful as to leave her under a hedge while you went drinking. I ain't going to trust you again in a hurry. My word, I wonder I didn't murder you!"

"Well, there, Dick, let bygones be bygones. What'll you do next?"

"Next? Why, lie safe at Moreton till first train to-morrow morning, and then get up to London and back to the old shop. Then let the police know as we can give information of the whereabouts of Miss—— there, no names."

"Wouldn't it be safer to go all the way with the cart?"

"No, stupid. It's likely enough they may follow us from Carsham—depends what sort of people they be, this here John and his lot. We must get out of this country as quick as ever we can."

That night John's Lily sobbed herself to sleep in a little black hole of a room, at the back of a low public-house in Moreton. The man and woman had changed their tone again, now that she seemed to be safely in their hands; perhaps it struck them that unkindness might not pay in the end. They did their best, though without success, to make her eat some supper. Finally the woman carried her upstairs, so weary with grief and the day's excitement that the fair little head could not hold itself up, but drooped and lay on its jailor's shoulder. Not unkindly the woman unwrapped the child and laid her down on a grimy little bed.

"Now you are a silly," she said. "Me and Dick's the kindest friends you've got, my dear. We're going to take you to a beautiful house where there's lots of servants and all kinds of pretty things, and sweets and toys as you never saw the like—leastways not since you was lost—and gentlemen and ladies to make ever such a fuss with you, and beautiful children to play with, and sweet new frocks so as you'll never be poor and shabby again. Oh, and such a lot of rooms—" she went on, seeing that the tired blue eyes had opened wide, and that in the dim flicker of the candle Lily was gazing with awakened interest—"and pictures on the walls and lots of lovely flowers——"

"The blue lady on the stairs!" Lily said suddenly. Some remembrance of her baby life, some impression that had lain asleep in the utterly changed existence of the last three years, woke up then in Lily's childish brain. She looked round the black little room with bewildered eyes.

"There—to be sure, yes," the woman said in wheedling tones. "And then you was lost, you don't remember about that—" it certainly was better that the child's memory should not revive there—"and then your poor dear papa, he looked for you everywhere, and now me and Dick, we've found you, and if you're a very good child we're going to take you back to him. Yes, little one, we're good friends, me and Dick."

But if any vision of the past had flashed for a moment on Lily's mind, it was soon forgotten. She was cold, she was tired and sick with crying, and she longed for the only home she really knew. So when the woman began again to talk of the beautiful house and all its riches, she turned her head aside with an impatient moan.

"I want John—I want John and mother!"

"Never mind, little missy—don't be naughty now. You'll see them again some day. Now go to sleep like a good girl."

"I must say my prayers."

In a moment she had scrambled down from the bed, and was kneeling on the dirty floor. "Our Father, which art in heaven." Such holy words, such a sweet and silvery little voice, had not often before been heard in that black den of a room. They were very strange to the ears of the poor degraded woman who stood by with the crooked dip candle in her hand, looking down on the fair golden head, the innocent face bent, the little hands reverently put together. She could not have moved or disturbed the child, even if Dick had been thumping on the door.

"O LORD, forgive my faults and comfort poor sinners, and bless all those that love me, for JESUS CHRIST'S sake. Amen."

It was the little form of prayer that Mrs. Randal had taught the child, with a thought in her heart for some distant father and mother who might have lost Lily. To-night she waited a moment, and added quickly out of her own head—"O LORD, please take me back to John."

"You didn't know what you was saying," said her companion, rather grimly, as she tucked her up in bed. "Whatever John may be, he isn't your own father, and it's him you're going back to, my dear."

After that she left her alone in the dark, and Lily, frightened once more and broken-hearted, sobbed till she fell asleep.

Very early the next morning she found herself sitting alone in the waiting-room at Moreton Road Station. Outside, a wild tempest of wind and rain was tearing past the wooden building, rattling the windows, streaming noisily down the roofs. The cold breeze that whistled among the booths at Carsham had brought this, and the second day of the fair was likely to be anything but cheerful. Dick and his wife had no objection to the bad weather. He despatched her and the child early to the station, lingering himself to the last moment in the comfortable bar of the inn. She, arriving at the station, found it was half an hour too early, and could not resist running back for an extra glass of something hot to cheer her through the journey. She kept out of his sight, knowing very well that he would not approve of her leaving the little girl alone. She had herself no fears on that score. Lily was neither old nor clever enough to run away. She left her quite quiet and sad and sleepy in a corner of the bench, so wrapped in shawls that her little face was hardly to be seen.

She had only been alone there a few minutes, when two people with wet umbrellas and waterproofs hurried along the platform and came in. They were an elderly man and his wife, who sat down side by side, and began talking of the business that was taking them to London by the early train. At first Lily in her misery hardly noticed them; but presently the man said—"It was a good thing that our friend John had not such weather as this for his long walk."

"Ah! I thought he might as well have stayed till this morning, but there never was such a young man for going home to his mother. Still, I've nothing to say against him. Of all your friends, Isaac, John Randal's the one I like the best."

"And well you may, Jemima," said the old schoolmaster. "He deserves both respect and affection. I am anxious to see Miss Mary Alfrick; I wish John would bring her one of these days to pay us a visit. And his little Lily too. It would give me sincere pleasure to see those three together."

"I'm afraid that poor child stands in the way of his marriage," said Mrs. Bland. "Goodness me, what's this?"

For suddenly the bundle of shawls in the opposite corner scrambled down from the bench, shuffled as well as it could across the floor, and made frantic efforts to climb into her lap.

"What little girl is this?" said the schoolmaster.

Lily pushed the shawl desperately back. With large eyes wet with tears she made her silent petition for help.

"Please," she said then, "I'm John's little girl, I'm John's Lily. Please take me home."

CHAPTER VIII

THE TRUTH

                        "We both have undergone
That trouble which has left me thrice your own:
Henceforward I will rather die than doubt."
                                                                                    —TENNYSON.

Rather to his wife's disappointment, Mr. Bland decided at once that he could not go to London that day. In a few minutes, in the dingy waiting-room, while she sat on Mrs. Bland's damp but friendly lap, and while the noise of the rain died gradually away, as if to listen to her story, Lily told John's two friends how some wicked people had stolen her away from the fair and said that John and mother should not have her any more.

"Well! It is a queer story to be sure. There's something behind as we don't understand," said Mrs. Bland. "As to this child, Isaac, wherever John picked her up, she is a little lady. Now I wonder if those people knew——"

She murmured these words mysteriously, while Lily gazed at her with heartfelt anxiety in her blue eyes, and repeated, "Please take me home."

"Yes, little one, and that's what we are going to do," said the schoolmaster. "Lift her up, Jemima, if you please. I'll carry her, and the umbrella too, if it isn't too wet to be of use. London must keep for another day: this child's safety must be seen to first."

"It's very inconvenient."

"Our convenience is not at present the first thing to be considered," said Mr. Bland gravely. "And London town was not built in a day, and is not likely to disappear in one. Come, my dear. We will take John's little girl home, Jemima; she shall be warmed and fed. I will then hire Dobson's trap and drive her over to Markwood. You can give us the pleasure of your company, if you feel so inclined."

"You'll both get wet to the skin. Better write to John to come and fetch her," said Mrs. Bland, rather disapprovingly.

"I shall do as I would be done by," said the schoolmaster.

Lily curled one arm round her new friend's neck, regardless of his wet mackintosh. She pressed her cold little face against his rough grey whiskers, and kissed him affectionately. As he carried her away from the station, hidden under his large and dripping umbrella, she looked over his shoulder and saw in the wet and misty distance the woman from whom she had escaped, hurrying back through the mud to rejoin her charge. Lily hid her eyes, and tightened her hold on Mr. Bland. "Take me home quick," she whispered in his ear.

Later in the day the rain cleared off entirely, and there was a clear yellow light shining in the sky when Mr. Bland, with Lily wrapped in Mrs. Bland's largest cloak nestling close by his side, turned the steady old horse from the high road into the Markwood lane. This was a horse of great virtue, except that he would not understand that Mr. Bland and Lily were in a hurry. They met a good many stragglers from the fair, though Mr. Bland drove through by-lanes, so as to avoid the main street of Carsham. Some of these people were noisy, but the horse took no notice of them. One man called out, "Why, ain't that the little kid as was lost? There's been folks hunting for her all night, high and low, up and down, all round about Carsham. Where did you pick her up, master?"

"Never you mind, my friend," replied the schoolmaster. "She'll be safe at home in half-an-hour, and nobody need concern themselves further."

Dobson's old horse, not being accustomed to such long journeys, chose to proceed through Markwood at a foot's pace, and stopped at several houses before he reached the blacksmith's door. Mr. Bland was not great as a driver, and neither whip nor reins nor encouraging "chucks" had any effect on the animal. At last, Lily dancing on the seat with impatience, and followed by groups of such village children as were not at the fair, the trap drew up at John's gate in the glow of the evening sun.

A woman was passing at the moment; it was Mrs. Alfrick, who, not being altogether bad, had spent some hours of self-reproach. "Well, I never!" she said.

But neither Mr. Bland nor Lily took any notice of her, and she hurried on home with the wonderful news. Mr. Bland was quite occupied with climbing down from his high seat, begging Lily all the time to wait till he could lift her down. As soon as the child's feet touched the ground, she sprang across the yard. At the door she waited a moment; and Mr. Bland never forgot the pretty, refined little gesture with which she turned and held up her finger to him, then gave three gentle taps on the old door.

"Any common child would have burst right in," he said to his wife afterwards.

Mrs. Randal's kitchen was hardly as tidy and bright as usual that afternoon. She had not had the heart for her usual cleaning and polishing, having sat up half the night for John, who had never come in at all till a couple of hours ago. He had found no trace of the lost child; Lily's own father, when he lost her, could hardly have been in a state of deeper dejection, more hopeless despair.

"I never would have believed it of Polly," said Mrs. Randal. "To take that child to the fair, when she knew your wishes as well as yourself, not to mention how uneasy I should be—and then never to come near me, John, last night or this morning! I'd have gone up myself to the farm, but what with worrying there was no strength left in me—besides, I couldn't bear to be out of the house, for fear you should come home—but I did think Polly——"

"Don't you mention Polly no more," said John, in a rough hoarse voice which did not sound like his own.

His mother lifted her tired eyes, full of a new sorrow, but his face was hidden in his hands, and she could read nothing there.

"I met Polly on the road last night," he said. "We had words, and no wonder. All's broke off between us two. So now you know, mother, and just please to say no more about it."