They sat down on the stile side by side. Laura gave up her errand, and
they talked fast. Polly was all curiosity. When was Laura to be married,
and what was she to wear?

"The plainest thing I can find," said Laura indifferently. "Unless
Augustina teases me into something I don't want." Polly inquired if it
would be in church. "In a Catholic church," said Laura with a shrug. "No
flowers--no music. They just let you be married--that's all."

Polly's-eyes jumped with amazement. "Why, I thowt they had everything so
grand!"

"Not if you will go and marry a heretic like me," said Laura. "Then they
make you know your place."

"But--but Laura! yo're to be a Romanist too--for sure?" cried Polly in
bewilderment.

"Do you think so?" said Laura. Her eyes sparkled. She was sitting on the
edge of the stile, one small foot dangling. Polly's rustic sense was once
more vaguely struck by the strange mingling in the little figure of an
extreme, an exquisite delicacy with some tough, incalculable element.
Miss Fountain's soft lightness seemed to offer no more resistance than a
daffodil on its stalk. But approach her!--whether it was poor Hubert, or
even----?

Polly looked and spoke her perplexity. She let Laura know that Miss
Fountain's conversion was assumed at Browhead Farm. Through her
blundering though not unkindly talk, Laura gradually perceived indeed a
score of disagreeable things. Mrs. Mason and her fanatical friend, Mr.