of coal, over which the equally black kettle hung on the crook.  In the back-kitchen Dolly Reid, Sylvia’s assistant during her mother’s absence, chanted a lugubrious ditty, befitting her condition as a widow, while she cleaned tins, and cans, and milking-pails.  Perhaps these bustling sounds prevented Sylvia from hearing approaching footsteps coming down the brow with swift advance; at any rate, she started and suddenly stood up as some one entered the open door.  It was strange she should be so much startled, for the person who entered had been in her thoughts all during those long pauses.  Charley Kinraid and the story of crazy Nancy had been the subjects for her dreams for many a day, and many a night.  Now he stood there, bright and handsome as ever, with just that much timidity in his face, that anxiety as to his welcome, which gave his accost an added charm, could she but have perceived it.  But she was so afraid of herself, so unwilling to show what she felt, and how much she had been thinking of him in his absence, that her reception seemed cold and still.  She did not come forward to meet him; she went crimson to the very roots of her hair; but that, in the waning light, he could not see; and she shook so that she felt as if she could hardly stand; but the tremor was not visible to him.  She wondered if he remembered the kiss that had passed between them on new year’s eve—­the words that had been spoken in the dairy on new year’s day; the tones, the looks, that had accompanied those words.  But all she said was—­

‘I didn’t think to see yo’.  I thought yo’d ha’ sailed.’

‘I told yo’ I should come back, didn’t I?’ said he, still standing, with his hat in his hand, waiting to be asked to sit down; and she, in her bashfulness, forgetting to give the invitation, but, instead, pretending to be attentively mending the stocking she held.  Neither could keep quiet and silent long.  She felt his eyes were upon her, watching every motion, and grew more and more confused in her expression and behaviour.  He was a little taken aback by the nature of his reception, and was not sure at first whether to take the great change in her manner, from what it had been when last he saw her, as a favourable symptom or otherwise.  By-and-by, luckily for him, in some turn of her arm to reach the scissors on the table, she caught the edge of her work-basket, and down it fell.  She stooped to pick up the scattered stockings and ball of worsted, and so did he; and when they rose up, he had fast hold of her hand, and her face was turned away, half ready to cry.

‘What ails yo’ at me?’ said he, beseechingly.  ‘Yo’ might ha’ forgotten me; and yet I thought we made a bargain against forgetting each other.’  No answer.  He went on:  ‘Yo’ve never been out o’ my thoughts, Sylvia Robson; and I’m come back to Monkshaven for nought but to see you once and again afore I go away to the northern seas.  It’s not two hour sin’ I landed at Monkshaven, and I’ve been near neither kith nor kin as yet; and now I’m here you won’t speak to me.’