I did not know exactly what hard lines meant, but I said—­

‘I suppose it is very disagreeable.’

And with this concession, not caring to hear any more in the same vein, I rose, intending to take my departure.

’No, that’s jest it.  I knew ye’d say it, Maud.  Ye’re a kind lass—­ye be—­’tis in yer pretty face.  I like ye awful, I do—­there’s not a handsomer lass in Liverpool nor Lunnon itself—­no where.’

He had seized my hand, and trying to place his arm about my waist, essayed that salute which I had so narrowly escaped on my first introduction.

‘Don’t, sir,’ I exclaimed in high indignation, escaping at the same moment from his grasp.

’No offence, lass; no harm, Maud; you must not be so shy—­we’re cousins, you know—­an’ I wouldn’t hurt ye, Maud, no more nor I’d knock my head off.  I wouldn’t.’

I did not wait to hear the rest of his tender protestations, but, without showing how nervous I was, I glided out of the room quietly, making an orderly retreat, the more meritorious as I heard him call after me persuasively—­’Come back, Maud.  What are ye afeard on, lass?  Come back, I say—­do now; there’s a good wench.’

As Milly and I were taking our walk that day, in the direction of the Windmill Wood, to which, in consequence perhaps of some secret order, we had now free access, we saw Beauty, for the first time since her illness, in the little yard, throwing grain to the poultry.

’How do you find yourself to-day, Meg?  I am very glad to see you able to be about again; but I hope it is not too soon.’

We were standing at the barred gate of the little enclosure, and quite close to Meg, who, however, did not choose to raise her head, but, continuing to shower her grain and potato-skins among her hens and chickens, said in a low tone—­

‘Father baint in sight?  Look jist round a bit and say if ye see him.’

But Dickon’s dusky red costume was nowhere visible.

So Meg looked up, pale and thin, and with her old grave, observant eyes, and she said quietly—­

’’Tisn’t that I’m not glad to see ye; but if father was to spy me talking friendly wi’ ye, now that I’m hearty, and you havin’ no more call to me, he’d be all’ays a watching and thinkin’ I was tellin’ o’ tales, and ’appen he’d want me to worrit ye for money, Miss Maud; an’ ’tisn’t here he’d spend it, but in the Feltram pottusses, he would, and we want for nothin’ that’s good for us.  But that’s how ‘twould be, an’ he’d all’ays be a jawing and a lickin’ of I; so don’t mind me, Miss Maud, and ’appen I might do ye a good turn some day.’

A few days after this little interview with Meg, as Milly and I were walking briskly—­for it was a clear frosty day—­along the pleasant slopes of the sheep-walk, we were overtaken by Dudley Ruthyn.  It was not a pleasant surprise.  There was this mitigation, however:  we were on foot, and he driving in a dog-cart along the track leading to the moor, with his dogs and gun.  He brought his horse for a moment to a walk, and with a careless nod to me, removing his short pipe from his mouth, he said—­