At last the cart appeared, coming up the hill with the peculiar lurching deportment of market carts. The pony had a bunch of marigolds on each ear, and there was lilac on the whip. They packed the animals in--the cat giving ventriloquial mews from her basket, the rabbit in its hutch, the bird in its wooden cage, and Foxy sitting up in front of Hazel. The harp completed the load. They drove off amid the cheers of the next-door children, and took their leisurely way through the resinous fragrance of larch-woods. The cream-coloured pony was lame, which gave the cart a peculiar roll, and she was tormented with hunger for the marigolds, which hung down near her nose and caused her to get her head into strange contortions in the effort to reach them. The wind sighed in the tall larches, and once again, as on the day of the concert, they bent attentive heads towards Hazel. In the glades the wide-spread hyacinths would soon be paling towards their euthanasia, knowing the art of dying as well as that of living, fortunate, as few sentient creatures are, in keeping their dignity in death. When they drove through the quarry, where deep shadows lay, Hazel shivered suddenly. 'Somebody walking over your grave,' said Abel. 'Oh, dunna say that! It be unlucky on my wedding-day,' she cried. As they climbed the hill she leaned forward, as if straining upwards out of some deep horror. When their extraordinary turn-out drew up at the gate, Abel boisterously flourishing his lilac-laden whip and shouting elaborate but incomprehensible witticisms, Edward came hastily from the house. His eyes rested on Hazel, and were so vivid, so brimful of tenderness, that Abel remained with a joke half expounded. 'My Hazel,' Edward said, standing by the cart and looking up, 'welcome home, and God bless you!' 'You canna say fairer nor that,' remarked Abel. 'Inna our 'Azel peart? Dressed up summat cruel inna she?' Edward took no notice. He was looking at Hazel, searching hungrily for a hint of the same overwhelming passion that he felt. But he only found childlike joy, gratitude, affection, and a faint shadow for which he could not account, and from which he began to hope many things. If in that silent room upstairs he had come to the opposite decision; if he had that very day told Hazel what his love meant, by the irony of things she would have loved him and spent on him the hidden passion of her nature. But he had chosen the unselfish course. 'Well,' he said in a business-like tone, 'suppose we unpack the little creatures and Hazel first?' Mrs. Marston appeared. 'Oh, are you going to a show, Mr. Woodus?' she asked Abel. 'It would have been so nice and pleasant if you would have played your instrument.' 'Yes, mum. That's what I've acome for. I inna going to no show. I've come to the wedding to get my belly-full.' Mrs. Marston, very much flustered, asked what the animals were for. 'I think, mother, they're for you.' Edward smiled.