She came close to him, “Then I want my diploma,” she said, for he had told her about the schools.

Reverently the old scholar kissed her brow.  “This is the only diploma I am authorized to give—­the love and homage of your teacher.”

“And my degree?” She waited with that wide, questioning look in her eyes.

“The most honorable in all the world—­a sure enough lady.”

CHAPTER XXXI.

Castle building.

The corn was big enough to cultivate the first time, and Young Matt with Old Kate was hard at work in the field west of the house.

It was nearly three weeks since the incident at the mill, since which time the young fellow had not met Sammy Lane to talk with her.  He had seen her, though, at a distance nearly every day, for the girl had taken up her studies again, and spent most of her time out on the hills with the shepherd.  That day he saw her as she turned into the mill road at the lower corner of the field, on her way to the Forks.  And he was still thinking of her three hours later, as he sat on a stump in the shade of the forest’s edge, while his horse was resting.

Young Matt recalled the fight at the mill with a wild joy in his heart.  Under any circumstances it was no small thing to have defeated the champion strong man and terror of the hills.  It was a glorious thing to have done the deed for the girl he loved, and under her eyes.  Sammy might give herself to Ollie, now, and go far away to the great world, but she could never forget the man who had saved her from insult, when her lover was far too weak to save even himself.  And Young Matt would stay in the hills alone, but always he would have the knowledge and the triumph of this thing that he had done.  Yes, it would be easier now, but still—­still the days would be years when there was no longer each morning the hope that somewhere before the day was gone he would see her.

The sun fell hot and glaring on the hillside field, and in the air was the smell of the freshly turned earth.  High up in the blue a hawk circled and circled again.  A puff of air came sighing through the forest, touched lightly the green blades in the open, slipped over the ridge, and was lost in the sky beyond.  Old Kate, with head down, was dreaming of cool springs in shady dells, and a little shiny brown lizard with a bright blue tail crept from under the bottom rail of the fence to see why the man was so still.

The man turned his head quickly; the lizard dodged under the rail; and old Kate awoke with a start.  Someone was coming along the road below.  Young Matt knew the step of that horse, as well as he knew the sound of old Kate’s bell, or the neigh of his own sorrel.

The brown pony stopped at the lower corner of the field, and a voice called, “You’d better be at work.  I don’t believe you have ploughed three rows since I passed.”