“Just to look after the cattle, and to see that the pigs are not all dead.  My wonder is that he should ever have gone away.”

“I must go up to him at once.”

“Oh, yes, of course.”

“And what shall I say about the house?”

“It’s not about that,—­at least I think not.  I don’t think he’ll speak about that again till you speak to him.”

“But if he does?”

“You must put your trust in Providence.  Declare you’ve got a bad headache, as I told Hopkins just now; only you would throw me over by not understanding.  I’ll walk with you down to the bridge.”  So they went off together across the lawn.

But Lily was soon left alone, and continued her walk, waiting for her mother’s return.  As she went round and round the gravel paths, she thought of the words that she had said to her mother.  She had declared that she also was widowed.  “And so it should be,” she said, debating the matter with herself.  “What can a heart be worth if it can be transferred hither and thither as circumstances and convenience and comfort may require?  When he held me here in his arms”—­and, as the thoughts ran through her brain, she remembered the very spot on which they had stood—­“oh, my love!” she had said to him then as she returned his kisses—­“oh, my love, my love, my love!” “When he held me here in his arms, I told myself that it was right, because he was my husband.  He has changed, but I have not.  It might be that I should have ceased to love him, and then I should have told him so.  I should have done as he did.”  But, as she came to this, she shuddered, thinking of the Lady Alexandrina.  “It was very quick,” she said, still speaking to herself; “very, very.  But then men are not the same as women.”  And she walked on eagerly, hardly remembering where she was, thinking over it all, as she did daily; remembering every little thought and word of those few eventful months in which she had learned to regard Crosbie as her husband and master.  She had declared that she had conquered her unhappiness; but there were moments in which she was almost wild with misery.  “Tell me to forget him!” she said.  “It is the one thing which will never be forgotten.”

At last she heard her mother’s step coming down across the squire’s garden, and she took up her post at the bridge.

“Stand and deliver,” she said, as her mother put her foot upon the plank.  “That is, if you’ve got anything worth delivering.  Is anything settled?”

“Come up to the house,” said Mrs Dale, “and I’ll tell you all.”

CHAPTER LVIII

The Fate of the Small House