But those children were almost man and woman on that July evening when Jenny left the train, and walked alone down the street beneath the hill with the bruise on her shoulder, and a sore weight on her heart. Some red cows passed peaceably by her as she went, with the urchin who drove them loitering behind; and a young workman was leaning outside the railings of the chapel, proud of holding his baby in his arms. Jenny went on alone, with her head bent always downwards, and her mind in her child’s sick-room, and in tender contrivances, and the burdens that were both of memory and foreboding pressing their habitual weight upon her heart till she did not hear the good-evening of a neighbour who stood at his door with his pipe in his mouth. The man’s eyes followed her curiously as she walked, but she did not turn round, so she was not aware of it. ‘Well, mother, you have been a while,’ were the words that greeted her, as she slowly opened her cottage-door at last, not prepared for the fever-worn face that raised itself from the cushions of the great wooden arm-chair on the hearth. ‘You wouldn’t expect to see me here downstairs, but I couldn’t rest after what Mrs Beeton said--she says that they’re going to Rantan us through the village--I wish I was a man, that I might kill them all! We’ll never get over this even’, never, never; we had best leave the place as soon’s this night is done!’ These were not the most cheering words to come as greeting to an anxious heart at the close of a weary day; but Jenny, although they struck her like a blow, was more alarmed for her daughter than herself. With renewed anxiety she laid aside her bonnet, and came to the hearth to bend above her child; and Annie raised slowly her languid, beautiful face, shaken with the sobs that she had till then restrained. We will leave them to cling to each other, and to whisper, and go out into the village street to learn the rest. CHAPTER III A RANTAN