"Job Jagway said it was mouldy, you know,--that's why Adam punched him in the--"
"Yes, Auntie!" And immediately Small Porges' pen began to scratch, and his tongue to writhe and twist as before.
"I'm building all my hopes, this year, on the hops," said Anthea, sinking her head upon her hand, "if they should fail--"
"Well?" enquired Bellew, with his gaze upon the soft curve of her throat.
"Then don't--let us talk of something else--"
"Yes,--of Aunt Priscilla!" nodded Anthea, "she is in the garden."
"Go and find her--in the orchard!" repeated Anthea, "Oh do go, and leave us to our work."
Thus it was that turning obediently into the orchard, and looking about, Bellew presently espied a little, bright-eyed old lady who sat beneath the shadow of "King Arthur" with a rustic table beside her upon which stood a basket of sewing. Now, as he went, he chanced to spy a ball of worsted that had fallen by the way, and stooping, therefore, he picked it up, while she watched him with her quick, bright eyes.
"Good morning, Mr. Bellew!" she said in response to his salutation, "it was nice of you to trouble to pick up an old woman's ball of worsted." As she spoke, she rose, and dropped him a courtesy, and then, as he looked at her again, he saw that despite her words, and despite her white hair, she was much younger, and prettier than he had thought.
"I am Miss Anthea's house-keeper," she went on, "I was away when you arrived, looking after one of Miss Anthea's old ladies,--pray be seated. Miss Anthea,--bless her dear heart!--calls me her aunt, but I'm not really--Oh dear no! I'm no relation at all! But I've lived with her long enough to feel as if I was her aunt, and her uncle, and her father, and her mother--all rolled into one,--though I should be rather small to be so many,--shouldn't I?" and she laughed so gaily, and unaffectedly, that Bellew laughed too.
"I tell you all this," she went on, keeping pace to her flying needle, "because I have taken a fancy to you--on the spot! I always like, or dislike a person--on the spot,--first impressions you know! Y-e-e-s," she continued, glancing up at him side-ways, "I like you just as much as I dislike Mr. Cassilis,--heigho! how I do--detest that man! There, now that's off my mind!"