two shillings a week allowed him out of it; and that would pay the rent
of a nice two-roomed cottage down in Botfield, close to your work. Come,
that would make all of you comfortable.'

'You should bear in mind, Stephen,' said the master, 'that the place does
not of right belong to you at all; and the lord of the manor is coming to
shoot over the estate in September; and then I shall have orders to
remove you by force. So you had better take our offer.'

'Please, sir,' said Stephen, bowing respectfully, 'don't be angered with
me, but I can't go from what I said afore. Father told me never to give
up Fern's Hollow; and maybe he'd hear tell of it in heaven if I broke my
word to him. I can't do it, sir.'

'Well, wilful will have his way,' said Mr. Thomas, nodding at the master;
and as neither of them addressed Stephen again, he left the office,
amazed to find that he was not forbidden to return to work on the
following Monday.

The Red Gravel Pit, where Miss Anne had promised to meet her scholars on
Sunday morning, was a quarry cut out of the side of one of the hills,
from which the stones were taken for making and mending the roads in the
neighbourhood. The quarry had been hollowed out into a kind of enclosed
circle, only entered by the road through which the waggons passed. All
along the edge of the red rocks high overhead there was a coppice of
green hazel-bushes and young oaks, where the boys had spent many a Sunday
searching for wild nuts, and hunting the squirrels from tree to tree.
Stephen and Tim met half an hour earlier than the time appointed by Miss
Anne, and by dint of great perseverance and strength rolled together five
large stones, under the shadow of an oak tree; and placed four of them in