didn't want that, mother," said Faith.
CHAPTER IV
The illumination lasted through the night—until
"Night's candles were burnt out, and jocund day
Stood tip-toe on the misty mountain tops."
Very jocund she looked, with her light pink veils wreathing about the horizon, and the dancing white clouds which hurried up as the sun rose, driven by a fresh wind. Mr. Linden declared, when he came in to breakfast, that the day promised to equal the preceding night.
"And whoever wants more," he added, "must wait; for I think it will not surpass it."
With which, Mr. Linden stirred his coffee, and told Miss Danforth with a little look of defiance, "it was particularly good—she had better try a cup."
Miss Danforth instituted a fierce inquiry as to the direction of the preceding evening's walk; to which Faith gave an unsatisfactory answer.
"Did you ever look at coffee in connexion with the fatigues of life?" pursued Mr. Linden.
"I shall, probably, in future," said Miss Danforth. "Now Mr. Linden, I ask you; you're a nice man to give a straight answer;—where did you and Faith go?"
"I am glad I am a nice man," said Mr. Linden, "but I can scarce give a straight answer to that question."
"Why not, for pity's sake?"
"It must needs travel a crooked road."
"Did you?"
"It has left a meandering sort of recollection in my mind."
"Where did it lead to?"
"It led to another."
"What I want to know is," said Miss Danforth, "where did you find yourselves when you were furthest from home."
"Let me shew you," said he. "Suppose your plate to be a rock, and this tumbler of radishes a tree, and the table-cloth grass,—the moon over your head, crickets under your feet. Miss Faith walks round the rock, I follow her,—and we both follow the road. On the way, the still night air is enlivened with owls, grasshoppers, family secrets. Our attention is thus divided between the moon and sublunary affairs. Miss Faith—what shall I give you?"
Miss Danforth's curiosity seemed for once willing to be satisfied with fun; and Faith's hunger was in the same predicament.
"But child," said Mrs. Derrick, who had bent her attention upon the diagram at the other end of the table, "I don't recollect any such place!"
"Mother!" said Faith,—and her gravity gave way hopelessly.
"Squire Deacon sends his best compliments of the season," said Cindy opening the door a while later, "and he says they'll be to take supper precisely at four. I'm free to confess he don't look much sweeter than common," added Cindy.
"Pray Miss Faith," said Mr. Linden as they left the table, "what is the precise depth of water down at the shore?"
Faith had very near broke down again, for she laughed and blushed, a good deal more than her wont; and at last replied that "it depended on how far people went in—she never went very far herself."
"I was naturally curious," said he.
After a dinner somewhat more hasty than usual, Mr. Linden and two of the ladies set off for the shore. The blackberry jam, or some other hindering cause, kept Mrs. Derrick at home.
The country by daylight looked rich and smooth. At not a very great distance a slight hilly elevation bounded the horizon line, which nearer seen would have been found bristling with stern grey rock, itself a ridge of rock, one of the ribs of the rigid soil. But where the lane led down to the water, fair fields and crops extended on every side, spotted very picturesquely with clumps of woodland. All looked genial in the summer light. If the distant rocks spoke a stubborn soil, the fine growth between said that man had overcome it; and the fine order everywhere apparent said too that the victory had been effectual for man's comfort and prosperity. The stone walls, in some places thin and open, told of times when they had been hurriedly put up; moss on the rail fences said the rails had been long doing duty; within them no fields failed of their crops, and no crops wanted hoeing or weeding. No straw lay scattered about the ricks; no barrack roofs were tumbling down; no gate-posts stood sideways; no barnyards shewed rickety outhouses or desolate mangers. No cattle were poor, and seemingly, no people. It was a pretty ride the party had, in the little wagon, behind an old horse that knew every inch of the way and trotted on as if he were a part of it.
"How do you like Pattaquasset, Mr. Linden?" said Faith, leaning forward to reach him where he sat alone on the front seat.
"I like it—well," he answered a little musingly.
They came to the bridge and stream; and now they could see that Awasee River did not fill its sometime channel, but flowed in a bottom of alluvial soil, rich in bright-coloured marsh grass, which stretched up the country between two of those clumps of woodland they had seen from a distance. A little further on, just where the sandy road branched off to the shore, there stood a farm house, with a conglomerate of barns and outhouses, all painted to match, in bright yellow picked out with red.
"Do you see that settlement of farm-houses?" said Faith, leaning forward again,—"of all sizes, in uniform?"
"Is it the fashion here to put 'earmarks' on buildings?" he answered with a smile.
"Mr. Linden! You should ask Mr. Simlins that. I see his wagon there—he'll be down at the shore very likely. He's a character. He lives a mile and a half further on, just where the road turns off to Mrs. Somers'."
"Simlins!" was the only reply.
"He's a good sort of man, but he's funny."
"What is a good sort of man, Miss Faith?"
The old horse was walking quietly along the sandy road, and the smell of the salt water was becoming pleasantly perceptible.
"I suppose I mean by it," said Faith thoughtfully, "a man who is not very good, but who is on the good side of things."
"I don't call that a good sort," said Mr. Linden,—then looking round with a little smile he said, "You ought to say 'sort o' good.'"
Faith looked serious and as if she felt half rebuked.
"But," she said, "you would not call that a bad sort?"
"Then you mean that he is in the same road with what you call the best people, only not so far advanced?"
"No," said Faith doubtfully, "I don't mean so much as that.—I don't think Mr. Simlins is in the same road with you."
"How many best roads are there to the same place? As for instance—does it matter which of these two I take to the shore?"
"Only one leads to the shore," said Faith.
"Yet they seem to lie near together at the outset. The same is true of the 'other shore.'"
Faith sat back in her place with a face exceedingly unlike a young lady who was going to a merry-making.
But they were near the shore now; not only the salt smell proclaimed it, but they could
