It was thus without any sense of wrong-doing that Kate found herself walking along the footpath with Fred Huntley by her side on the October noon when John saw them. She was quite innocent of any evil intention. He had disappeared with the rest of the gentlemen in the morning, and Kate had not asked either herself or any one else what had become of him; and she had undertaken to walk down to the row of cottages outside the park gates as a matter of kindness to the housekeeper, who was busy. “I will go,” she had said quite simply, when Mrs Horner apologised for not having seen and given work to a poor needlewoman there. “Oh, Miss Kate, that will be so good of you--and it is just a nice walk,” the housekeeper had said; so that nothing could be more virtuous than the expedition altogether. Kate had not even meant to go alone; her companion, one of the young ladies of the party, had failed her at the last moment by reason of a headache, or some other young-lady-like ailment, and how could Kate tell that she should meet Fred Huntley coming out of the wood just as the trees screened her from the windows of the house? But she was not sorry she had met him. Walking along by herself in the silence, she had grown a little sad and confused in her mind about John and circumstances generally. She had not much time to think, with all the duties of mistress of the house on her head. But when she was alone she could not elude the questions--What did John mean by his silence?--was he unhappy, poor fellow? Was it her fault or his fault? Would the time ever come when Mr Crediton would consent, and everything would be arranged? Should she be able to make him happy if they were married? All these questions were passing through Kate’s mind. “He takes everything so seriously,” she said to herself; “he thinks one means it, and one so seldom means it.” This she said with a little plaint within her own bosom. And, if it must be confessed, a momentary comparison passed through her mind. Fred Huntley would be so very, very much easier to get on with; he would demand nothing more than she could give, whereas there was no limit to John’s demands. The comparison was involuntary, and she was ashamed of herself for making it, but still it had been made; and the next moment Fred Huntley himself had appeared to her stepping over the stile out of the wood.