Randolph, though he would not have confessed it, was a little shy of accosting any of the few passers-by.  Just because there were so few and the place was so quiet, the children felt themselves rather uncomfortably conspicuous, and they could not help noticing that here and there the inhabitants came rather unnecessarily to their doors to look at them as they passed.  It was not done rudely, and indeed it was only natural that the arrival of a new rector and his family at Seacove should attract a good deal of attention, considering that old Dr. Bunton and his wife had been fixtures there for more years than Mr. Vane himself had been in the world.

‘Oh yes,’ said Rough in an off-hand way, ’I can ask any one.  But we may as well walk on a little and look about us.  If it is a shop we’ll see the name.’

Just then there came out of a shop in front of them—­a baker’s, I think it was—­a small figure which walked on slowly some paces before them.

‘That’s the little girl of the dolls’ chairs,’ exclaimed Bridget.  ’Shall I run on and ask her?  I don’t mind.’

‘You never do,’ said Alie, and indeed Biddy was most comfortably untroubled with shyness.

‘Yes, run on and see if she knows where it is.’

Off trotted Biddy, her precious purchases tightly clasped in her hands.

‘Little girl,’ she called, when she got close to the other child.

[Illustration:  ‘Little girl,’ she called, when she got close to the other child.  P. 75.]

The little girl turned, and looked at Biddy full in the face with her grave earnest eyes without speaking.  And for half a moment Bridget did feel something approaching to shyness, but it gave her a comfortable fellow-feeling to see that the small stranger was also still carrying the little chairs she had bought.  They were not done up in paper like Biddy’s—­she had not waited for that,—­but she had covered them loosely with a very clean, very diminutive pocket-handkerchief, and Bridget saw quite well what they were.

‘Please,’ Biddy went on, slightly breathless—­it did not take much to put Biddy out of breath—­’please can you tell us where Mr. Fairchild’s is in this street?  Rough’s got a letter for him, but we don’t know if it’s a shop or only a house.’

‘Mr. Fairchild’s,’ repeated the little girl, ’he’s my father; it’s our shop.  I’ll show it you,’ and a faint pink flush of excitement came into her pale face.  These were the Rectory young ladies, she had been sure of it when she saw them in the bazaar.  Fancy—­wouldn’t mother be surprised to see them coming in with her?  And father, who had said she’d maybe never see them.  Was that the French ma’amselle with them?—­and Celestina glanced back at honest Jane Dodson, from ‘grandmamma’s’ village, walking along in her usual rather depressed fashion—­if so, French ma’amselles were very like English nurse-maids, thought her little observer.