Then the humour of the man, which had been stirred in him, took a new direction. “I should not care, just for the fun of the thing, to take him down with me to Westbarns and show him to Nanse as our share of Uncle Jerry’s goods. I heard the landlord of the Hare and Hounds say he wanted a serviceable dog to replace his young Newfoundland which he had been induced to sell. I’ll go bail that Uncle Jerry’s dog is serviceable.” The whim found favour with a whimsical poor man, and so Prince, not without difficulty and danger, was removed to the railway station and consigned to a dog-box. There he was so dazed and confounded by the darkness and the rapid motion—which he had only once experienced before, and that was on that far-away trip to Brighton, when he had been smuggled in Jack’s arms among a hilarious company into an open van—that he came out, in the course of an hour and a half, comparatively subdued, and condescended, without extreme pressure, to accompany Mr. Miles Noakes to his cottage. It was evening when the two arrived, jaded by travel, excitement, and disappointment. A much younger looking woman than Mr. Miles was a man, was gazing eagerly along the road in expectation of their arrival. She stood at the gate of a well-kept little garden, sweet with spring flowers—blue hyacinths, primroses, polyanthuses. She had lively hazel eyes and smooth dark hair, and wore a neat cap and clean apron. She might have been a capable, prized maid-servant in her day; she was still an active, tidy matron in her early prime. “You are come at last, Miles; you must be clean done up, but the children are a-bed, and your supper is ready,” she said hurriedly, while she kissed her husband, as if feeling it a relief to welcome him first before she asked the question with which her heart was beating, her breath coming fast and her lips quivering, while she had no attention to spare for his four-footed attendant. “All right, Nanse,” said Mr. Miles, entering the cottage before he vouchsafed any explanation. Perhaps his mind misgave him, or his heart smote him with regard to the jest he was about to make, as he looked round on the familiar dwelling—small, not without evidence of narrow means, but scrupulously clean and well ordered, from the gay patched quilt on the crib, in which the two children slept, to the well-scoured pewter mug with his beer flanking the plate of cold bacon, the better part of the dinner saved for his supper. It would be no jesting matter to Nanse to hear that the property of which he had been summoned to take possession had gone past them. When they had parted, she had not been able to help building on it, in her impulsive woman’s fashion, as what should render them easy in their worldly affairs, lighten the load on their backs, provide a welcome substitute when his strength must fail, and, above all, supply better schooling for the children, and raise them above all fear of want when she alone was left to labour for them.