And at last all opposition clears away. It must be Mr. Helbeck who has silenced Augustina--for even she complains no more. Trains are looked out; arrangements are made to fetch Polly from a half-way village; a fly is ordered to meet the 9.10 train at night. Why does one feel a culprit all through? Absurdity! Is one to be mewed up all one's life, to throw over all fun and frolic at Mr. Helbeck's bidding--Mr. Helbeck, who now scarcely sets foot in Bannisdale, who seems to have turned his back upon his own house, since that precise moment when his sister and her stepdaughter came to inhabit it? Never till this year was he restless in this way--so says Mrs. Denton, whose temper grows shorter and shorter. Oh--as to fun and frolic! The girl yawns as she looks out of window. What a long hot day it is going to be--and how foolish are all expeditions, all formal pleasures! 9.10 at Marsland--about seven, she supposes, at Froswick? Already her thoughts are busy, hungrily busy with the evening, and the return. * * * * * The train sped along. They passed a little watering-place under the steep wooded hills--a furnace of sun on this hot June day, in winter a soft and sheltered refuge from the north. Further on rose the ruins of a great Cistercian abbey, great ribs and arches of red sandstone, that still, in ruin, made the soul and beauty of a quiet valley; then a few busy towns with mills and factories, the fringe of that industrial district which lies on the southern and western border of the Lake Country; more wide valleys sweeping back into blue mountains; a wealth of June leaf and blossoming tree; and at last docks and buildings, warehouses and "works," a network of spreading railway lines, and all the other signs of an important and growing town. The train stopped amid a crowd, and Polly hurried to the door. "Why, Hubert!--Mr. Seaton!--Here we are!" She beckoned wildly, and not a few passers-by turned to look at the nodding clouds of tulle. "We shall find them, Polly--don't shout," said Laura behind her, in some disgust. Shout and beckon, however, Polly did and would, till the two young men were finally secured. "Why, Hubert, you never towd me what a big place 'twas," said Polly joyously. "Lor, Mr. Seaton, doant fash yoursel. This is Miss Fountain--my cousin. You'll remember her, I knaw."