“Not in years; she is between seventeen and eighteen: but my husband says that she is too childish to talk to, and always tells me to take her off his hands; he would rather talk with Mrs. Cameron.” “Indeed!” “Still I find something in her.” “Indeed!” “Not exactly childish, nor quite womanish.” “What then?” “I can’t exactly define. But you know what Mr. Melville and Mrs. Cameron call her as a pet name?” “No.” “Fairy! Fairies have no age; fairy is neither child nor woman.” “Fairy. She is called fairy by those who know her best? Fairy!” “And she believes in fairies.” “Does she?--so do I. Pardon me, I must be off. The day after to-morrow,--six o’clock.” “Wait one moment,” said Elsie, going to her writing-table. “Since you pass Grasmere on your way home, will you kindly leave this note?” “I thought Grasmere was a lake in the north?” “Yes; but Mr. Melville chose to call the cottage by the name of the lake. I think the first picture he ever sold was a view of Wordsworth’s house there. Here is my note to ask Mrs. Cameron to meet you; but if you object to be my messenger--” “Object! my dear Mrs. Braefield. As you say, I pass close by the cottage.” CHAPTER IV. KENELM went with somewhat rapid pace from Mrs. Braefield’s to the shop in the High Street kept by Will Somers. Jessie was behind the counter, which was thronged with customers. Kenelm gave her a brief direction about his portmanteau, and then passed into the back parlour, where her husband was employed on his baskets,--with the baby’s cradle in the corner, and its grandmother rocking it mechanically, as she read a wonderful missionary tract full of tales of miraculous conversions: into what sort of Christians we will not pause to inquire. “And so you are happy, Will?” said Kenelm, seating himself between the basket-maker and the infant; the dear old mother beside him, reading the tract which linked her dreams of life eternal with life just opening in the cradle that she rocked. He not happy! How he pitied the man who could ask such a question. “Happy, sir! I should think so, indeed. There is not a night on which Jessie and I, and mother too, do not pray that some day or other you may be as happy. By and by the baby will learn to pray ‘God bless papa, and mamma, grandmamma, and Mr. Chillingly.’” “There is some one else much more deserving of prayers than I, though needing them less. You will know some day: pass it by now. To return to the point: you are happy; if I asked why, would you not say, ‘Because I have married the girl I love, and have never repented’?” “Well, sir, that is about it; though, begging your pardon, I think it could be put more prettily somehow.” “You are right there. But perhaps love and happiness never yet found any words that could fitly express them. Good-bye, for the present.”