Grizzel quitted the Manor and went into the cottage, which the Squire had agreed to let to them: Roper was to come to it on the wedding-day. A daughter of Goody Picker's, one Mary Standish (whose husband had a habit of going off on roving trips and staying away until found and brought back by the parish), stayed with Grizzel, helping her to put the cottage in habitable order, and arrange in it the articles she bought. That sum of forty pounds seemed to be doing wonders: I told Grizzel I could not have made a thousand go as far. "Any left, Master Johnny? Why of course I shall have plenty left," she said. "After buying the bed and the set o' drawers and the chairs and tables; and the pots and pans and crockeryware for the kitchen; and the pig and a cock and hen or two; and perviding a joint of roast pork and some best tea and white sugar for the wedding-day, we shall still have pounds and pounds on't left. 'Tisn't me, sir, nor George nether, that 'ud like to lavish away all we've got and put none by for a rainy day." "All right, Grizzel. I am going to give you a tea-caddy." "Well now, to think of that, Master Johnny!" she said, lifting her hands. "And after the mistress giving me such a handsome gownd!--and the servants clubbing together, and bringing a roasting oven and beautiful set o' flat irons. Roper and me'll be set up like a king and queen." On Saturday, the day before that fixed for the wedding, I and Tod were passing the cottage--a kind of miniature barn, to look at, with a thatched roof, and a broken grindstone at the door--and went in: rather to the discomfiture of Grizzel and Mrs. Standish, who had their petticoats shortened and their arms bare, scouring and scrubbing and making ready for the morrow. Returning across the fields later, we saw Grizzel at the door, gazing out all ways at once. "Consulting the stars as to whether it will be fine to-morrow, Grizzel?" cried Tod, who was never at a loss for a ready word. "I was a-looking out for Mary Standish, sir," she said. "George Roper haven't been here to-night, and we be all at doubtings about several matters he was to have come in to settle. First he said he'd go on betimes to the church o' Sunday morning; then he said he'd come here and we'd all walk together: and it was left at a uncertainty. There's the blackberry pie, too, that he've not brought." "The blackberry pie!" said I. "One that Mrs. Dodd, where he lodges, have made a present of to us for dinner, Master Johnny. Roper was to ha' brought it in to-night ready. It won't look well to see him carrying of a baked-pie on a Sunday morning, when he've got on his wedding-coat. I can't think where he have got to!" At this moment, some one was seen moving towards us across the field path. It proved to be Mary Standish: her gown turned up over her head, and a pie in her hands the size of a pulpit cushion. Red syrup was running down the outside of the dish, and the crust looked a little black at the edges.