‘You have guessed it exactly with your usual acuteness, Miss Middleton,’ said Ernest, who, slightly confused at having to act as amateur stable-boy, had now recovered his usual self-possession,—never long absent, to do him justice. ‘I will come in as soon as I have stabled the horses.’ When Ernest returned he found the ladies evidently concluding a short narrative to Mr. Jedwood, in which he guessed himself to have figured. Nothing could be warmer or more pleasurable, however, than their recognition. ‘And so, Mr. Neuchamp, here we meet, after all our arguments, and passages-of-arms,’ said the younger sister. ‘We are on our native heath, you know, so we shall take the offensive. How do you find all the new theories and schemes for improvement stand the climate?’ ‘Not so very badly,’ assented Ernest boldly. ‘I am biding my time, like the Master of Ravenswood. I intend to cause a sensation by carrying them out when I have a station of my own.’ ‘Oh, you must get one in this district,’ affirmed the elder sister with determination; ‘it would be so pleasant to have some one to talk to. We are living in utter solitude, as far as rational conversation is concerned.’ Mr. Jedwood at this juncture ‘trusted that, as they did him the honour to pay him a visit now and then, they did not include Garrandilla in the conversational solitude.’ ‘Oh, you know, you’re such an old friend. We can recollect riding to Garrandilla with papa ever since we could be trusted on horseback. It is one of our chief pleasures and resources. But really, Mr. Jedwood, you ought to build a new cottage. I used to think the old hut a splendid place once, but it looks now, you must confess, rather small.’ ‘Two rooms for one man, and that man an old bachelor, Miss Middleton, are not so very bad. I’m used to the old place. I can sit there and write my letters, and here, by the chimney side, I smoke my pipe and watch the embers. But I think I must put up a new place, if it’s only for my young lady friends. I’ll see about it after shearing, after shearing.’ But this promise of a comparatively palatial edifice after shearing had been made, to the young ladies’ knowledge, for several years past, and they evidently did not place much faith in it; Miss Middleton asserting that it was lucky Mr. Jedwood had not commenced life at Garrandilla in a watch-box, as he most certainly would have continued the use of that highly compressed apartment.