To Betty's simple soul a kiss under the mistletoe bough was of no further significance. She had been kissed by Jack, and even her Aunt Dorothy had received a kiss from a neighbouring farmer who had visited them on Christmas day. Betty pleaded that if the Squire was disposed to be kind and friendly to the old grandfather it was a risk to anger him. If they could keep the farm during his life times might improve, and there might be saving instead of loss, and the debt paid back. Both girls felt that the debt itself had a peculiar interest for them. It had been originally incurred to save their father from death, for death by hanging was then the punishment awarded to forgery. Bryda, however, preserved silence as to the Squire, and when she had returned to Bristol Betty found the necklace and the silver comb hidden away in a deep drawer in a bureau. Betty was suddenly struck with an idea. 'Perhaps the Squire is really in love with her, and if he is, why should she be so angry? It would be a fine thing for Bryda, who sets such store by pretty things, and is so much more of the lady than I am. Dear Bryda, I should love to see her happy--but oh, poor Jack! what would he say?' And as she recalled his fierce looks as he sprang upon Mr Bayfield she added, 'And what might he not _do_?' It is always difficult to realise how swiftly a certain period which we fix for any great decision in our lives, or any event which is to seriously affect us, will come. We look forward, especially in youth, to six or nine months and think there is time yet, we need not determine _yet_ on any particular course of action, or make any definite plan yet. And then, even while we are thinking that there is yet delay, the days and weeks and months, perhaps years, have passed, and we find ourselves changing 'not yet' changed into the inexorable _now_. It was thus with Bryda when she had pleaded for delay from Mr Bayfield. The hour for decision looked far away, and she had tried to put off thinking about it, and, trust with the hopefulness of youth, that all would be well. Her life at Mrs Lambert's was not uncongenial to her, and she rose daily in the old lady's favour. Her hunger for books was in a measure satisfied, and she found good pasturage in the standard works of those times, with which Mr Lambert's library was well furnished. Though the lace mending and lace cleaning for Mrs Lambert's caps and whimples and neckerchiefs and aprons went on, and though the preparation of dainty dishes to please the lawyer's appetite when he came home after hours spent in his office gave more and more satisfaction, Bryda found, and made time for her favourite pursuit. She was now allowed to take the books from the shelves and study them at leisure, and an old edition of Shakespeare's plays filled her with a strange thrill of delight. They were to Bryda, as to many another novice, like an introduction into a new world.