“Well—­of all things!” gasped Lane, and straightway became speechless.

“You’re right, Daren; they are coming in.  Isn’t that nice of them?  Now, don’t you dare show I told you anything.  Miss Hill is so easily embarrassed.  She’s the most sensitive woman I ever knew.”

Lane recovered in time to go through the cottage to the front porch and to hear Miss Hill greet Mel affectionately, and announce with the tone of a society woman that she had encountered Colonel Pepper on the way and had brought him along.  Lane had met the little schoolteacher, but did not remember her as she appeared now, for she was no longer plain, and there was life and color in her face.  And as for embarrassment, not a trace of it was evident in her bearing.  According to Mel, the mere sight of man, much less of one of such repute as Colonel Pepper, would once have been sufficient to reduce Miss Hill to a trembling shadow.

But the Colonel!  None of his courage manifested an appearance now.  To Lane’s hearty welcome he mumbled some incoherent reply and mopped his moist red face.  He was wonderfully and gorgeously arrayed in a new suit of light check, patent leather shoes, a tie almost as bright as his complexion, and he had a carnation in his buttonhole.  This last proof of the Colonel’s mental condition was such an overwhelming shock to Lane that all he could do for a moment was stare.  The Colonel saw the stare and it rendered him helpless.

Miss Hill came to the rescue with pleasant chat and most interesting news to the exiles.  She had intended coming out to the cottage for ever so long, but the weather and one thing or another falling on a Saturday, had prevented until to-day.  How pretty the little home!  Did not the Colonel agree with her that it was so sweet, so cosy, and picturesquely situated?  Did they have chickens?  What pleasure to have chickens, and flowers, too!  Of course they had heard about Mr. Harry White and the widow, about the dissension in Doctor Wallace’s church.  And Margaret Maynard was far from well, and Helen Wrapp had gone back home to her mother, and Bessy Bell had grown into a tall ravishingly beautiful girl and had distracted her mother by refusing a millionaire, and seemed very much in love with young Dalrymple.

“And I’ve the worst class of girls I ever had,” went on Miss Hill.  “The one I had last year was a class of angels compared to what I have now.  I reproved one girl whose mother wrote me that as long as Middleville had preachers like Doctor Wallace and teachers like myself there wasn’t much chance of a girl being good.  So I’m going to give up teaching.”

The little schoolmistress straightened up in her chair and looked severe.  Colonel Pepper shifted uneasily, bent his glance for the hundredth time on his shiny shoes and once more had recourse to his huge handkerchief and heated brow.

“Well, Colonel, it seems good to see you once more,” put in Lane.  “Tell me about yourself.  How do you pass the time?”