Zita drew a stool to the fireside. The turf glowed red. The stool was low; when she seated herself, her knees were as high as her bosom. She folded her arms round them and closed her hands, lacing her fingers together and looking smilingly over her knees at Kainie, with a gleam in her face of expectant triumph. Kainie knelt at the hearth and put on the kettle. She turned her head and watched Zita, whose features were illumined by the fire glow, as they had been shortly before by that of the setting sun. Kerenhappuch could not refrain from saying, 'What an uncommon good-looking girl you are!' 'Yes, so most folks say,' responded Zita, with indifference; 'and I suppose I am that.' Kainie was somewhat startled at this frank acceptance of homage. She pursed up her lips and offered no further compliments. 'I suppose Pip Beamish is sweet on you,' said Zita,—'tremenjous?' 'Poor fellow!' sighed the girl of the mill. 'Perhaps he is, but it is no good. He has not got even a mill to look after now, and I have barely enough wage to keep me alive. What is more, the Commissioners are against him, and won't let him get any work in the fen any more.' 'Then let him go out of the fen?' 'Out of the fen?' exclaimed Kainie. 'How you talk! As if a fen-man could do that! You don't find frogs on top of mountains, nor grow bulrushes in London streets. That ain't possible.' 'But there are fens elsewhere.' 'Where?' 'I do not know. In America, I suppose. There is all sorts of country there, to suit all sorts of people. I'd go there if I were he.' 'If there are fens in America, that's another matter. But what is it you want with me, now, partick'ler?' Zita settled herself in her seat. 'I've come to have a deal with you,' she said chirpily. 'That is what I have come about.' 'But—what do you want of me?' 'We will come to that presently,' said the Cheap Jack girl, and with her usual craft or experience she added, 'I will let you know what my goods are before I name the price.' 'Price—money? I have no money.' 'It is not money I want.' 'I do not fancy there's anything I require,' said Kerenhappuch. 'And that is fortunate, for I have not only no money to buy with, but no place where I could stow away a purchase.' 'Nobody knows what they wants till they see things or hear about them,' said Zita. 'Bless you! if you were as well acquainted with the British public as father and me, you'd say that. Take it as a rule, folks always set their heads on having what they never saw before, didn't know the use of, and don't know where to put 'em when they have 'em. I'm telling you this, though it is not to my advantage. Now, what do you say to a ream of black-edged paper and mourning envelopes to match?—that's twenty quires, you know.' 'I write to nobody. I have no relations but my Uncle Drownlands, and he never speaks to me—won't notice me. I am not likely to write letters to him.'