The farmer received him cordially—­Susan civilly, and with a somewhat feeble smile.  The former soon engaged him in agricultural talk.  Susan, meanwhile, made the tea in silence, and Meadows began to think she was capricious, and had no sooner got what she asked for than she did not care for it.  After a while, however, she put in a word here and there, but with a discouraging languor.

Presently Farmer Merton brought her his tea-cup to be replenished, and upon this opportunity Susan said a word to her father in an undertone.

“Oh, ay!” replied the farmer very loud indeed; and Susan colored.

“What was you saying to me about that country—­that Christmas-day is the hottest day in the year?” began Mr. Merton.

Meadows assented, and Merton proceeded to put other questions, in order, it appeared, to draw once more from Meadows the interesting information of last night.

Meadows answered shortly and with repugnance.  Then Susan put in:  “And is it true, sir, that the flowers are beautiful to the eye, but have no smell, and that the birds have all gay feathers, but no song?” Then Susan, scarcely giving him time to answer, proceeded to put several questions, and her manner was no longer languid, but bright and animated.  She wound up her interrogatories with this climax: 

“And do you think, sir, it is a country where George will be able to do any good.  And will he have his health in that land, so far from every one to take care of him?”

And this doubt raised, the bright eyes were dimmed with tears in a moment.

Meadows gasped out, “Why not? why not?” but soon after, muttering some excuse about his horse, he went out with a promise to return immediately.

He was no sooner alone than he gave way to a burst of rage and bitterness.

“So, she only sent for me here to make me tell her about that infernal country where her George is.  I’ll ride home this instant—­this very instant—­without bidding them good-by.”

Cooler thoughts came.  He mused deeply a few minutes, and then, clinching his teeth, returned slowly to the little parlor:  he sat down and took his line with a brisk and cheerful air.

“You were asking me some questions about Australia.  I can tell you all about that country, for I have a relation there who writes to me.  And I have read all the books about it, too, as it happens.”

Susan brightened up.

Meadows, by a great histrionic effort, brightened up, too, and poured out a flood of really interesting facts and anecdotes about this marvelous land.

Then, in the middle of a narrative, which enchained both his hearers, he suddenly looked at his watch, and putting on a fictitious look of dismay and annoyance, started up with many excuses and went home—­not, however, till Susan had made him promise to come again next market-day.

As he rode home in the moonlight Susan’s face seemed still before him.  The bright look of interest she had given him, the grateful smiles with which she had thanked him for his narration—­all this had been so sweet at the moment, so bitter upon the least reflection.  His mind was in a whirl.  At last he grasped at one idea, and held it as with a vise.