“Good-day, miss,” said Nancy; “I thought as may be I might have had a few words with your mother. If she’s the person I take her for, I used to know her long, long ago; and I’ve a deal that’s very serious to say.” “You frightened us dreadfully looking in at the window,” said Pamela. “And mamma has such a bad headache; she has been a good deal--worried. Would you mind coming back another time?--or is it any thing I can say?” “There’s something coming down the road,” said Nancy; “and I am tired and I can’t walk back. If it’s the carrier I’ll have to go, miss. And I can’t say the half nor the quarter to you. Is it the carrier? Then I’ll have to go. Tell her it was one as knew her when we was both young--knew her right well, and all her ways--knew her mother. And I’ve a deal to say; and my name’s Nancy Christian, if she should ask. If she’s the woman I take her for, she’ll know my name.” “And you’ll come back?--will you be sure to come back?” asked Pamela, carelessly, yet with a girl’s eagerness for every thing like change and news. The cart had stopped by this time, and Mrs. Swayne had brought forth a chair to aid the stranger in her ascent. The place was roused by the event. Old Betty stood at her cottage, and Swayne had hobbled out from the kitchen, and even Mrs. Preston, forgetting the headache, had stolen to the window, and peeped out through the small Venetian blind which covered the lower part of it to look at and wonder who the figure belonged to which had so strange a likeness to herself. Amid all these spectators Nancy mounted, slowly shaking out once more the dust from her skirts. “I’ll be late, and she’ll give me an awful talking to,” she said. “No; I can’t stop to-day. But I’ll come again--oh yes, I’ll come again.” She kept looking back as long as she was in sight, peeping round the hood of the wagon, searching them through and through with her anxious gaze; while all the bystanders looked on surprised. What had she to do with them? And then her looks, and her dress, and her black eager eyes, were so like Mrs. Preston’s. Her face bore a very doubtful, uncertain look as she was thus borne solemnly away. “I couldn’t know her after such a long time; and I don’t see as she could have had a child so young,” was what Nancy was saying to herself, shaking her head, and then reassuring herself. This visit made a sensation which almost diverted public attention from Mr. John; and when Nancy’s message was repeated to Mrs. Preston, it was received with an immediate recognition which increased the excitement. “Nancy Christian!” Mrs. Preston repeated all the evening long. She could think of nothing else. It made her head so much worse that she had to go to bed, where Pamela watched her to the exclusion of every other interest. This was Nancy’s first visit. She did not mean, even had she had time, to proceed to any thing more important that day. CHAPTER XXV. HOW SARA REGARDED THE MOTE IN HER BROTHER’S EYE.