The old man was almost in tears at the sight of
them again in the familiar place. He had put
on his Sunday clothes to do them honour; and to
conceal his agitation he kept up a pretended
bustle about their luggage. To the indignation
of the inn-porters, who were of a later generation,
he would wheel it himself to the parsonage,
though he broke down from fatigue once or
twice on the way, and had to stand and rest, his
ladies waiting by his side, and making remarks
on the alterations of houses and the places of
trees, in order to give him ample time to recruit
himself, for there was no one to wait for them
and give them a welcome to the parsonage, which
was to be their temporary home. The respectful
servants, in deep mourning, had all prepared, and
gave Ellinor a note from Mr. Brown, saying that
he purposely refrained from disturbing them that
day after their long journey, but would call on
the morrow, and tell them of the arrangements
he had thought of making, always subject to
Miss Wilkins's approval.

These were simple enough; certain legal forms
to be gone through, any selections from books or
furniture to be made, and the rest to be sold by
auction as speedily as might be, as the successor
to the living might wish to have repairs and
alterations effected in the old parsonage. For
some days Ellinor employed herself in business
in the house, never going out except to church.
Miss Monro, on the contrary, strolled about everywhere,
noticing all the alterations in place and
people, which were never improvements in her
opinion. Ellinor had plenty of callers (her
tenants, Mr. and Mrs. Osbaldistone among
others), but, excepting in rare cases—most of
them belonged to humble life—she declined to see
every one, as she had business enough on her
hands: sixteen years makes a great difference in
any set of people. The old acquaintances of
her father's in his better days were almost all
dead or removed; there were one or two remaining,
and these Ellinor received; one or two
more, old and infirm, confined to their houses,
she planned to call upon before leaving Hamley.
Every evening, when Dixon had done his work
at Mr. Osbaldistone's, he came up to the parsonage,
ostensibly to help her in moving or packing
books, but really because these two clung to
each other—were bound to each other by a bond
never to be spoken about. It was understood
between them that once before Ellinor left she
should go and see the old place, Ford Bank.
Not to go into the house, though Mr. and Mrs.
Osbaldistone had begged her to name her own
time for revisiting it when they and their family
would be absent, but to see all the gardens and
grounds once more; a solemn, miserable visit,
which, because of the very misery it involved,
appeared to Ellinor to be an imperative duty.

Dixon and she talked together as she sat
making a catalogue one evening in the old
low-browed library; the casement windows were
open into the garden, and the May showers had
brought out the scents of the new-leafed sweet-briar
bush just below. Beyond the garden-hedge
the grassy meadows sloped away down to the
river; the parsonage was so much raised that
sitting in the house you could see over the
boundary hedge. Men with instruments were
busy in the meadow. Ellinor, pausing in her
work, asked Dixon what they were doing.

"Them's the people for the new railway," said
he. "Nought would satisfy the Hamley folk but
to have a railway all to themselves—coaches is
not good enough now-a-days."

He spoke with a tone of personal offence
natural to a man who had passed all his life
among horses, and considered railway-engines
as their despicable rivals, conquering only by
stratagem.

By-and-by Ellinor passed on to a subject the
consideration of which she had repeatedly urged
upon Dixon, and entreated him to come and form
one of their household at East Chester. He was
growing old, she thought, older even in looks and
feelings than in years, and she would make him
happy and comfortable in his declining years if
he would but come and pass them under her
care. The addition Mr. Ness's bequest made to
her income would enable her to do not only this,
but to relieve Miss Monro of her occupation of
teaching; which, at the years she had arrived at,
was becoming burdensome. When she proposed
the removal to Dixon he shook his head.

"It's not that I don't thank you, and kindly,
too; but I am too old to go chopping and
changing."

"But it would be no change to come back to
me, Dixon," said Ellinor.

"Yes it would. I were born i' Hamley, and it's
in Hamley I reckon to die."

On her urging him a little more, it came out
that he had a strong feeling that if he did not
watch the spot where the dead man lay buried,
the whole would be discovered; and that this
dread of his had often poisoned the pleasure of
his visit to East Chester.

"I don't rightly know how it is, for I sometimes
think if it wasn't for you, missy, I should
be glad to have made it all clear before I go; and
yet at times I dream, or it comes into my head as
I lie awake with the rheumatics, that some one
is there, digging; or that I hear them cutting
down the tree; and then I get up and look out
of the loft window—you'll mind the window
over the stables, as looks into the garden, all
covered over wi' the leaves of the jargonelle
pear-tree? That were my room when first I
came as stable-boy, and tho' Mr. Osbaldistone
would fain give me a warmer one, I allays tell
him I like the old place best. And by times I've
getem up five or six times a night to make sure
that there was no one at work under the tree."

Ellinor shivered a little. He saw it, and restrained
himself in the relief he was receiving
from imparting his superstitious fancies.

"You see, missy, I could never rest at nights
if I did not feel as if I kept the secret in my
hand, and held it tight day and night, so that I