THAT home was in order although it was the morning, and daintily ready for the business of the day--an appearance that was always conspicuous wherever the hands of Jenny moved and worked. She had risen before the dawn to get her son’s breakfast ready, and she had not been idle since the dawn had passed; already all things were ‘straight,’ and she was able to get out her stitching and to sit down to it. If the echoes of the ‘Rantan’ of the night before were lingering stormily about the place, no signs of that hidden tempest could be seen in the room in which she and her daughter sat and worked. And yet it may be that the clamour of the night was sounding in the hearts of both women as they sewed. Their room had a raftered ceiling, which was painted yellow, whilst paper, woodwork and fire-place were a sober, greyish green, the quaint colouring being contrasted round the window with dimity hangings, exquisitely white. In the corner was an old clock which reached from floor to ceiling, whose face of brass made a familiar brightness there, and the sober walls were everywhere ornamented with numbers of little photographs in frames. Annie sat in an easy chair upon one side of the hearth, and her mother was opposite, each with work on her knee, for the master here had no reason to complain of any want of industry in the women of his home. The echoes of the ‘Rantan’ were in those women’s ears, and, as they sat silent, their thoughts were turned to him. ‘When’ll father be comin’ back,’ Annie cried at last, and fiercely; ‘comin’ back in his shame to disgrace us all agen? I wish he’d come back to-night so as he might hear the sound o’ that clamour ringin’ in his ears. I’ll not stay here to be made a laughin’ stock, to hear the village rejoicin’ over us, I’ll go and wander away, for miles away, so as no one may see me, or know whose child I am.’ She had never before spoken in that manner of her father, but her mother had not the heart to rebuke her now. ‘I have tried to be good and to be respectable,’ Annie cried, with a feverish movement of her hands; ‘I’ve liked for to think as men should think well on us, and shouldn’t not breathe a word agen our name. I won’t try so hard now, I’ll have some fun mysel’; it isn’t no good whate’er I think or do; I’ll not shut mysel’ so close as I ha’ done; they may answer for it as drives one past one’s hope.’ She relapsed into silence, but her lips were working as if the thoughts she had spoken were wrestling in her mind. Ah! Annie, a dangerous thought and a dangerous resolve, however natural to despair as young as yours. Her mother heard the words, and in some degree felt the danger; but, herself sad at heart, she had no power to speak.