even a sort of half business-like air, "Wife, ye may make my shroud, and
sew it and all; but I wouldn't buy the stuff of Bess Crummles; she is an
ill-tongued woman, and came near making mischief between you and me last
Lammermas as ever was."

"Shroud!" cried Mrs. Eaves, getting seriously alarmed. "Why, Abel, what
is Cairnhope old church to you? You were born in an other parish."

Abel slapped his thigh. "Ay, lass, and another county, if ye go to
that." And his countenance brightened suddenly.

"And as for me," continued Janet, "I'm Cairnhope; but my mother came
from Morpeth, a widdy: and she lies within a hundred yards of where
I sit a talking to thee. There's none of my kin laid in old Cairnhope
churchyard. Warning's not for thee, nor me, nor yet for our Jock. Eh,
lad, it will be for Squire Raby. His father lies up there, and so do all
his folk. Put on thy hat this minute, and I'll hood myself, and we'll go
up to Raby Hall, and tell Squire."

Abel objected to that, and intimated that his own fireside was
particularly inviting to a man who had seen diabolical fires that came
and went, and shone through the very stones and mortar of a dead church.

"Nay, but," said Janet, "they sort o' warnings are not to be slighted
neither. We must put it off on to Squire, or I shall sleep none this
night."

They went up, hand in hand, and often looked askant upon the road.

When they got to the Hall, they asked to see Mr. Raby. After some demur