"What! Molly Potts, eh? that I believe was the name he mentioned?" interposed Frank. "Pshaw, nonsense!" retorted his companion; "it can't be her name. The idea's too preposterous to be true. That insolent clown has dared to try to hoax us; for which I promise him, if I were his master, I'd break every bone in his good-for-nothing body. Molly Potts! It never can be so. The thing's quite out of the question--utterly impossible!" "Impossible or not, I don't see that it's likely to make much difference either to you or me," observed Frank; "for the chances are, we never set eyes upon either of them again." "Then," said Vernon, "I almost wish that I, at least, had never set eyes upon one of them at all. To know that such an angel moves about on earth, and to think that I may never see her more, must ever form a source of deep regret; and yet it seems strange--very strange--that I--I--who have ever looked upon the fairest of the sex unmoved, should be so struck as I was here by a mere glance." "A very hard hit, certainly," said Frank: "I never saw a fellow more completely floored." "Better book that to tell again," retorted vernon; "it really is so seldom you do say a witty thing, that it's a pity it should be lost upon these dull moors." "Then, unless we intend to follow the fate of my wit," resumed Frank, "we must step out a little faster to get out of them; which we sha'n't do under a couple of miles' walk more, I promise you." CHAPTER II. Frank Trevelyan's statement proved tolerably correct as to distance, for little more than two miles brought our travellers clear of the rugged moorlands; when, after ascending the brow of a steep hill, a sight broke suddenly upon them, which, though unlike the scenery they had previously passed over, presented if possible a more dreary picture. As far as the eye could reach, nothing could be discerned but one vast wilderness of undulating sandy hillocks, totally devoid of vegetation, except a kind of coarse rush, which, in spite of the shifting nature of the soil, had here and there contrived to spring up and take root; and now to add to this cheerless aspect, the sky, which hitherto had been bright and clear, began to lower with those dark threatening clouds which form the sure forerunner of a heavy squall of wind and rain--no pleasant thing for two lightly-clad pedestrians to be overtaken with in a bleak open country on a chill November day. Even Frank, who, with his merry chat, had latterly kept his companion's spirits alive, the latter of whom had begun to complain both of hunger and fatigue--even Frank felt disconcerted at the desolate prospect before him, as well as disappointed at not discovering the mining village, containing the snug little public-house, which he had been informed he should fall in with at the termination of the stony moorlands. Resolved however to put the best face he could upon the matter, our little hero assured his tall