"There is to be a picnic next Thursday," he said; "I am dragged into it. The gathering-place will be in a meadow, under some trees near the river. I've got a little boat, and a man to row people to and from the island." "I shall like that," remarked Jamie, who was listening. "Mammy will be sure to let me go!" Elsie did not feel strongly inclined to go to the picnic. She had taken the quiet of the country into her heart, and wanted to escape from society. But Mrs. Lennard disapproved of this growing taste for solitude. "You must mingle with the others, my dear, whether you like them or not," she said. "I shall come upstairs and turn over your dresses. You have a cool, brown holland-looking thing, trimmed with bands of scarlet silk and black lace. I think you shall wear that." CHAPTER XVII _THE PICNIC_ "The chatterers chatter, here and there, They chatter of they know not what." --OWEN MEREDITH. "The cool, brown holland-looking thing" was donned, in obedience to Mrs. Lennard's decree. Mrs. Verdon had written to her milliner to send her down something new for the occasion in the shape of headgear. But Elsie had spent an hour in her room, on the day before the picnic, and had retrimmed a black chip hat with black lace and soft knots of scarlet ribbon. "I am not a rich woman," she said to the rector's wife; "and if I were, I should still like to use the gifts that have been given me. I think we should not let any gift get rusty for lack of use." "You would have made an excellent wife for a poor man, my dear," Mrs. Lennard remarked. "I shall never be any man's wife," said Elsie. "I mean to be a little sister of the poor, and especially devote myself to children. That is my vocation; I see it plainly." "Indeed"--Mrs. Lennard leaned back in her chair with a satisfied little smile as she surveyed her favourite--"I don't think I would adopt that kind of dress just yet, if I were you. Black lace and a touch of scarlet are very becoming." The day of the picnic was as balmy and blue as those that had gone before. The dew was still hanging on the clustered white roses which climbed to her latticed casement when Elsie looked out. The sweet, wet blossoms touched her face as she leaned forward into the pure morning air. Her window overlooked that side of the garden nearest to the lane; and some one, strolling between the leafy hedges, looked up and saw a vision of a bright yet delicate face, framed in a quantity of thick, dark, rumpled hair. He stood still, well hidden by the screen of leaves, and gazed upward in silent delight. The pretty picture only lasted half a minute; she vanished, and he, finding that the casement remained a blank, went back over a gate, and across dew-wet fields, to his solitary breakfast. The picnic was exactly like other picnics. A space of level turf, under the shade of some fine beeches, had been chosen as the banqueting-place.