keep what I have!"

Thereupon Lovey sat up, listening. For outside she heard a feeble
wail.

She slipped out of bed. Holding the image tight in her right arm,
she drew the bolt cautiously. On the threshold at her feet, lay her
own babe, nestling in a bed of bracken.

She would have stooped at once and snatched him to her. But the
stone Christling hampered her, lying so heavily in her arm. For a
moment, fearing trickery, she had a mind to hurl it far out of doors
into the night. . . . It would fall without much hurt into the soft
sand of the towans. But on a second thought she held it forth gently
in her two hands.

"I never meant to hurt 'en, Aun' Mary," she said. "But a firstborn's
a firstborn, be we gentle or simple."

In the darkness a pair of invisible hands reached forward and took
her hostage.

When it was known that the Piskies had repented and restored Lovey
Bussow's child to her, the neighbours agreed that fools have most of
the luck in this world; but came nevertheless to offer their
congratulations. Meriden the Priest came also. He wanted to know
how it had happened; for the Piskies do not easily surrender a child
they have stolen.

Lovey--standing very demure, and smoothing her apron down along her