and kissed her, saying softly, coaxingly: “She’ll be all right to-morrow. We’ll go an’ see her then, an’ she’ll be glad enough to have us. We’ll give in to her then, poor old Gran’ma. She can boss you about, an’ me as well, to-morrow as much as she likes. She feels it hard, being tied to her bed. But to-day is ours, surely—isn’t it? To-day is ours, an’ you’re not sorry, are you?”
“But I’ve got no gloves, an’ I’m sure my hair’s a sight. I never thought she could ’a reached up like that.”
George laughed, tickled.
“No,” he said, “she was in a temper. But we can get you some gloves directly we get to Nottingham.”
“I haven’t a farthing of money,” she said.
“I’ve plenty!” he laughed. “Oh, an’ let’s try this on.”
They were merry together as he tried on her wedding ring, and they talked softly, he gentle and coaxing, she rather plaintive. The mare took her own way, and Meg’s hat was disarranged once more by the sweeping elm-boughs. The yellow corn was dipping and flowing in the fields, like a cloth of gold pegged down at the corners under which the wind was heaving. Sometimes we passed cottages where the scarlet lilies rose like bonfires, and the tall lark-spur like bright blue leaping smoke. Sometimes we smelled the sunshine on the browning corn, sometimes the fragrance of the shadow of leaves. Occasionally it was the dizzy scent of new haystacks. Then we rocked and jolted over the rough cobblestones of Cinderhill, and bounded forward again at the foot of the enormous pit hill, smelling of sul-
