Simon and his grandson had not yet turned the corner, when Richard heard a snort he knew: there, sure enough, stood Miss Brown, hitched to the garden-paling, peaceable but impatient.
"Yes, lad! She's been here an hour and more. Jessie came and told me, but I knew it: I heard the mare, and knew the sound of my own shoes on her!--I doubt if she'll stand it much longer though!" he added, as she pawed the road. "Well, she's a fine creature!"
"I don't mean the mare! I mean the mistress!"
"Miss Wylder is just noble!" said Richard. "But I'm afraid she got into trouble last night!"
"It don't sound much like it!" returned the old man, as Barbara's musical, bird-like laugh came from the cottage. "She ain't breaking her heart!--Alice, as you call her, must be doing well, or missie wouldn't be laughing like that!"
As they entered, Barbara came gliding down the perpendicular stair in front of them, her face yet radiant with the shadow of the laugh they had heard.
"Good morning, Mr. Armour!" she said. "--I did not expect to see you so soon again, Mr. Tuke. Will you put me up!"
Richard released Miss Brown, got her into position, and gave his hand to Barbara's foot, as he had seen Mr. Lestrange do. But lifting, he nearly threw her over Miss Brown's back. She burst into her lovely laugh, clutched at a pommel, and held fast.
"I'm not quite ready to go to heaven all at once!" she said.
"I thought you were!" answered Richard. "But indeed I beg your pardon! I might have known how light you must be!"
"May I walk a little way alongside of you, miss?"
"You have a right; I have offered you my company more than once," answered Barbara.
"Why is there no way to the heaven you believe in, but the terrible gate of death?" asked Richard at length. "If a God of love, as you say your God is, made the world, and could not--for want of room, I suppose--let his creatures live on in it, he would surely have thought of some better way out of it than such a ghastly one!"
Perhaps the most surprising thing about Barbara was her readiness. Very seldom had one to wait for her answer.
"This morning," she said, "for the first time with me on her back at least, Miss Brown refused a jump--and I grant the place _looked_ ugly! But I gave her a little sharp persuasion, and she took it beautifully, coming away as proud of herself as possible.--If there be a God, he must know as much better than you and I, as I know better than Miss Brown. One who never did anything we couldn't understand, couldn't be God. How else could he make things?"