The old woman looked up placidly from her darning: "Oh! these came when my poor brother died and the old home was broken up. I'm glad to have them, as I never remember a time when they weren't in the old kitchen at home. I often think it's strange how bits of chiney and brittle stuff like that lives on, long after solid flesh and bone has turned to dust. And it's a queer thing, Master Nat, as one gets old, how one lives among the dumb. Bits of chiney ... and the Silent People," and she wiped a couple of tears from her eyes. Then she added, "Where these old bits of things came from I never rightly knew. I suppose the horse-shoe's valuable, but even in bad harvests my poor father would never turn it into money. He used to say that it had been above our door in his father's time, and in his grandfather's time, and it had best stay there. I shouldn't wonder if he thought it had been dropped by Duke Aubrey's horse. And as for the shells and pots ... when we were children, we used always to whisper that they came from beyond the hills." Master Nathaniel gave a start, and stared at her in amazement. "From beyond the hills?" he repeated, in a low, horrified voice. "Aye, and why not?" cried Hempie, undaunted. "I was country-bred, Master Nat, and I learned not to mind the smell of a fox or of a civet cat ... or of a Fairy. They're mischievous creatures, I daresay, and best left alone. But though we can't always pick and choose our neighbours, neighbourliness is a virtue all the same. For my part, I'd never have chosen the Fairies for my neighbours--but they were chosen for me. And we must just make the best of them." "By the Sun, Moon, and Stars, Hempie!" cried Master Nathaniel in a horrified voice, "you don't know what you're talking about, you...." "Now, Master Nat, don't you try on your hoighty-toighty-his-Worship-the-Mayor-of-Lud-in-the-Mist-knock-you-down-and-be-thankful-for-small-mercies ways with me!" cried Hempie, shaking her fist at him. "I know very well what I'm talking about. Long, long ago I made up my mind about certain things. But a good nurse must keep her mind to herself--if it's not the same as that of her master and mistress. So I never let on to you when you were a little boy, nor to Master Ranulph neither, what I thought about these things. But I've never held with fennel and such like. If folks know they're not wanted, it just makes them all the more anxious to come--be they Fairies or Dorimarites. It's just because we're all so scared of our neighbours that we get bamboozled by them. And I've always held that a healthy stomach could digest anything--even fairy fruit. Look at my boy, now, at Ranulph--young Luke writes he's never looked so bonny. No, fairy fruit nor nothing else can poison a clean stomach." "I see," said Master Nathaniel drily. He was fighting against the sense of comfort that, in spite of himself, her words were giving him. "And are you quite happy, too, about Prunella?"