One of her tormenting factors was not to be so treated.  Philemon alone made nothing of the change of season, riding the nine miles between his home and Greenwood by daylight or by moonlight, as if his feeling for the girl not merely warmed but lighted the devious path between the drifts.  Yet it was not to make love he came; for he sat a silent, awkward figure when once within doors, speaking readily enough in response to the elders, but practically inarticulate whenever called upon to reply to Janice.  Her bland unconsciousness was a barrier far worse than the snow; and never dreaming that he was momentarily declaring his love for her in a manner far stronger than words, he believed her wholly ignorant of what he felt, and stayed for hours at a time, longing helplessly for a turn of events which should make it possible for him to speak.

Philemon was thus engaged or disengaged one December morning when Peg entered the parlour where the family were sitting as close to the fire as the intense glow of the hickory embers would allow, and handing Janice a letter with an air of some importance, remarked, “Charles he ask me give you dat.”  Then, colonial servants being prone to familiarity, and negro slaves doubly so, Peg rested her weight on one foot, and waited to learn what this unusual event might portend.  All present instantly fixed their eyes upon Janice, but had they not done so it is probable that she would have coloured much as she did, for the girl was enough interested and enough frightened to be quite unconscious of the eyes upon her.

“A letter for thee, lass!” exclaimed the squire.  “Let ’s have the bowels of it.”

The necessity for that very thing was what made the occurrence so alarming to Janice, for her woman’s intuition had at once suggested, the moment she had seen the bold hand-writing of the superscription, that it could be from none other than Evatt, and she had as quickly surmised that her father and mother would insist upon sight of the missive.  Unaware of what it might contain, she sat with red cheeks, not daring to break the seal.

“Hast got the jingle brains, child?” asked her mother, sharply, “that thou dost nothing but stare at it?”

Janice laid the letter in her lap, saying, “’T will wait till I finish this row.”  It was certainly a hard fate which forced her to delay the opening of the first letter she had ever received.

“’T will nothing of the sort,” said her mother, reaching out for the paper.  “Art minded to read it on the sly, miss?  There shall be no letters read by stealth.  Give it me.”

“Oh, mommy,” begged the girl, desperately, “I’ll show it to you, but—­oh—­let me read it first, oh, please!”

“I think ’t is best not,” replied her mother.  “Thy anxiety has an ill look to it, Janice.”

The girl handed the letter dutifully, and with an anxious attention watched her mother break it open, all pleasure in the novelty of the occurrence quite overtopped by dread of what was to come.