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[Illustration: The old lady tapped her stick impatiently on the hard gravel.
AUTHOR OF 'CARROTS;' 'THE PALACE IN THE GARDEN;' 'A CHARGE FULFILLED;' 'IMOGEN;' 'THE BEWITCHED LAMP,' etc.
W. & R. CHAMBERS, LIMITED LONDON AND EDINBURGH
A good old country lodge, half hid with blooms Of honeyed green, and quaint with straggling rooms.
Give me simplicity, that I may know Thy ways, Know them and practise them.
THE OLD LADY TAPPED HER STICK IMPATIENTLY ON THE HARD GRAVEL _Frontispiece_
AND THEN FRANCES RELATED THE WHOLE, MARGARET LISTENING INTENTLY TILL ALMOST THE END Page 75
JACINTH'S BROWS CONTRACTED, AND THE LINES OF HER DELICATE FACE HARDENED, BUT SHE SAID NOTHING 141
JACINTH SAT DOWN ON A STOOL AT LADY MYRTLE'S FEET AND LOOKED UP IN HER FACE 177
'IT IS SO GOOD OF YOU, MEETING ME LIKE THIS,' THE YOUNGER WOMAN WHISPERED 207
'AH WELL!' SAID LADY MYRTLE, 'ANOTHER DREAM VANISHED!' 243
It stood not very far from the corner--the corner where the lane turned off from the high-road. And it suited its name, or its name suited it. It was such a pretty, cosy-looking house, much larger really than it seemed at the first glance, for it spread out wonderfully at the back.
It was red too--the out-jutting front, where the deep porch was, looking specially red, in contrast with the wings, which were entirely covered with ivy, while this centre was kept clear of any creepers. And high up, almost in the roof, two curious round windows, which caught and reflected the sunset glow--for the front was due west--over the top of the wall, itself so ivy grown that it seemed more like a hedge, might easily have been taken as representing two bright, watchful eyes. For these windows were, or always looked as if they were, spotlessly clean and shining.
'What a quaint name! how uncommon and picturesque!' people used to say the first time they saw the house and heard what it was called. I don't know if it will spoil the prettiness and the quaintness if I reveal its real origin. Not so _very_ long ago, the old house was a queer, rambling inn, and its sign was the redbreasted bird himself; somewhere up in the attics, the ancient board that used to swing and creak of a windy night, was still hidden--it may perhaps be there to this day! And somebody (it does not matter who, for it was not any somebody that has to do with this story) took a fancy to the house--fast growing dilapidated, and in danger of sinking from a respectable old inn into a very undesirable public-house, for the coaches had left off running, and the old traffic was all at an end--and bought it just in time to save it from such degradation.