grandfather told me you sent no word of your coming."

She spoke quickly, with a refinement of accent which puzzled him until
he remembered the malicious hints Solomon Hatch had let fall at the
tavern. That she was, in reality, of his blood and the child of his
uncle, he had not doubted since the moment she had smiled at him from
her seat on the oxcart. How much was known, he now wondered. Had his
uncle provided for her? Was his mother--was his Aunt Kesiah--aware of
the truth?

"She missed my letter, I suppose," he replied. "Has she been long away?"

"Only a week. She is expected home day after to-morrow."

"Then I shall beg you to open the house for me."

She had turned back to the old hound, and was bending over to place his
bowl of bread and milk on the hearth. A log fire, in which a few pine
branches stood out illuminated like boughs of flame, filled the big
stone fireplace, which was crudely whitewashed to resemble the low walls
of the room. A kettle hung on an iron crane before the blaze, and the
singing of the water made a cheerful noise amid a silence which struck
Gay suddenly as hostile. When the girl raised her head he saw that her
face had grown hard and cold, and that the expression of her eyes had
changed to one of indignant surprise. The charming coquetry had fled
from her look, yet her evident aversion piqued him into a half smiling,
half serious interest. He wondered if she would marry that fine looking
rustic, the miller, and if the riotous Gay blood in her veins would
flow placidly in her mother's class? Had she, too, inherited, if not the
name, yet the weaknesses of an older race? Was she, like himself, cursed