as ourn be!"

"They ought to be ready for picking, soon,--do you think sixty people
will be enough?"

"Ah!--they'll be more'n enough, Miss Anthea."

"And, Adam--the five-acre field should be mowed today."

"I'll set the men at it right arter breakfast,--I'll 'ave it done, trust
me, Miss Anthea."

"I do, Adam,--you know that!" And with a smiling nod she turned away.
Now, as Bellew walked on beside her, he felt a strange constraint upon
him such as he had never experienced towards any woman before, and the
which he was at great pains with himself to account for. Indeed so rapt
was he, that he started suddenly to find that she was asking him
a question:

"Do you--like Dapplemere, Mr. Bellew?"

"Like it!" he repeated, "like it? Yes indeed!"

"I'm so glad!" she answered, her eyes glowing with pleasure. "It was a
much larger property, once,--Look!" and she pointed away across
corn-fields and rolling meadow to the distant woods. "In my
grandfather's time it was all his--as far as you can see, and farther,
but it has dwindled since then, and to-day, my Dapplemere is very
small indeed."