“E-es,” returned Adam reflectively, “I’ve see’d maids now and then when I did use to come down to buy a few little oddments in the town, but I never took no notice of them--I never knowed any of them. I be glad to know you, Alice.” Alice made no answer. She picked a leaf from the hedge and chewed it. Had it not been so dark Adam might have noticed the sudden rush of colour that overspread her face. “The chaps hereabouts do often seem to go out a-walkin’ wi’ maids,” resumed Adam. “I were a-thinkin’--you and me mid go a-walkin’ sometimes.” “We mid,” she agreed. “Sunday, maybe?” suggested Adam, with a sudden note of exultation in his voice. “If you could get off for a good long bit, Alice, we mid step up to Oakleigh Woods. I haven’t been there yet, but they do tell I they’re splendid.” “They’re nice enough,” said Alice, somewhat dubiously. “We’ll have to see what mother says,” she added. “Do ye ax her then,” suggested Adam. Alice moved away from him, and glanced back over her shoulder. “Maybe I will,” said she. Mrs. Cluett, on being consulted, was at first doubtful and inclined to be irate. “This do seem like coortin’,” she remarked severely. Alice twisted the corner of her apron without replying. It certainly did look rather like courting. “Be you and that chap thinking o’ bein’ sweethearts?” resumed Mrs. Cluett. Alice raised defiant dark eyes: “’Twouldn’t be no such very great harm if we was,” she returned. “He be a likely chap, Adam be; he’ve a-got a few pounds laid by, and if him an’ me was to make a match of it you wouldn’t need to pay en no wage.” This was a practical aspect of the affair which had not hitherto struck Mrs. Cluett; her countenance relaxed. “But he haven’t axed I yet,” said Alice discreetly. Mrs. Cluett drew a long breath. “Well I haven’t got no objections to your walking out wi’ he on Sunday, my dear,” she remarked condescendingly; and Alice dropped her apron and went away smiling. Sunday came, and the pair duly set forth, Mrs. Cluett watching their departure from the kitchen window, not without some elation, for indeed her maid was, as she said to herself, a fine piece, and Adam, as he strode along by her side, was “so well set-up as a granadier”. Alice chattered away gaily while they walked, tucking up her pretty blue skirt to show her starched white petticoat, while her curly head, under its rose-crowned hat, turned this way and that as they passed friends and neighbours. Other heads turned to gaze after her, and many jests and laughs were exchanged, and not a few sly innuendos as to the possible outcome of events. Alice would laugh and blush then, and glance surreptitiously at Adam; but the ex-warrener was more taciturn even than usual that day, and though his face wore a contented expression, he appeared to take little heed of his surroundings.