Then I went off up the hill to the church after Mattie, even then not making up my mind what I was going to do, but with an idea that all things somehow might work together for good to me if I only had the sense to see how, and turn things that way.

As I come up to the church I was just in time to see her old green gown going in at the porch, and when I come up the key was in the door, and she hadn’t come out.  Quick as thought, the idea come to me to have a joke with her and lock her in, so she shouldn’t meet him, and next minute I had turned the key in the lock softly, and stole off through the church porch, and up to the ash copse, which I couldn’t make a mistake about, for there’s only one within a mile of the church.

Jack was there, though it was before the time.  I could see his blue tie and white shirt-front shining through the trees.

When I locked her in I only meant to have a sort of joke—­at least, I think so,—­but when I come close up to him and saw how well off he looked, and the diamond ring on his fingers, and his pin and his gold chain, I thought to myself—­

’Well, you go to Liverpool to-morrow, young man!  And she ain’t got your address, and, likely as not, if you go away vexed with her, you won’t leave it with your aunt, and one wife is as good as another, if not better, and as for her caring for you, that’s all affectation and silliness—­so here goes.’

He stepped forward, with his hands held out to me, but when he saw it was me he stopped short.

‘Why, Miss Jane,’ he said, ’I beg your pardon.  I was expecting quite a different person.’

‘Yes, I know,’ I says, ‘you was expecting my cousin Mattie.’

‘And isn’t she coming?’ he asks very quick, looking at me full, with his blue eyes.

‘I hope you won’t take it hard, Mr. Halibut,’ says I, ’but she said she’d rather not come.’

‘Confound it!’ says he.

‘You see,’ I went on, ’it’s a long time since you was at home, and you not writing or anything, and some girls are very flighty and changeable; and she told me to tell you she was sorry if you were mistaken in her feelings about you, and she’s had time to think things over since three years ago; and now you’re so well off, she says she’s sure you’ll find no difficulty in getting a girl suited to your mind.’

‘Did she say that?’ he said, looking at me very straight.  ’It’s not like her.’

’I don’t mean she said so in those words, or that she told me to tell you so; but that’s what I made out to be her mind from what she said between us two like.’

’But what message did she send to me?  For I suppose she sent you to meet me to-day.’

Then I saw that I should have to be very careful.  So to get a little time I says, ’I don’t quite like to tell you, Mr. Halibut, what she said.’

‘Out with it,’ says he.  ‘Don’t be a fool, girl!’

‘Well, then,’ I says, ’if it must be so, her words were these:  “Tell Jack,” she says, “that I shall ever wish him well for the sake of what’s past, but all’s over betwixt him and me, and—­“’