'Oh, Mr. Backhouse, I'm so glad!' was all she could find to say. But her sweet trembling face spoke for her. After a pause, she added--'Does he write with his own hand?' 'You mun see for yorsel'.' He held it out to her. She looked at it mystified. 'But it's not opened!' 'I hadna juist me spectacles,' said Father Time, cautiously. 'Mebbee yo'll read it to me.' 'But it's to his mother!' cried Nelly. 'I can't open your wife's letter!' 'You needn't trooble aboot that. You read it, Mum. There'll be noothin' in it.' He made her read it. There was nothing in it. It was just a nice letter from a good boy, saying that he had been knocked over in 'a bit of a scrap,' but was nearly all right, and hoped his father and mother were well, 'as it leaves me at present.' But when it was done, Father Time took off his hat, bent his grey head, and solemnly thanked his God, in broad Westmorland. Nelly's eyes swam, as she too bowed the head, thinking of another who would never come back; and Tommy, thumb in mouth, leant against her, listening attentively. At the end of the thanksgiving however, Backhouse raised his head briskly. 'Not that I iver believed that foolish yoong mon as wrote me that Dick wor dead,' he said, contemptuously. 'Bit it's as weel to git things clear.' Nelly heartily agreed, adding-- 'I may be going to London next week, Mr. Backhouse. You say your son will be in the London Hospital. Shall I go and see him?' Backhouse looked at her cautiously. 'I doan't know, Mum. His moother will be goin', likely.' 'Oh, I don't want to intrude, Mr. Backhouse. But if she doesn't go?' 'Well, Mum; I will say you've a pleasant coontenance, though yo're not juist sich a thrivin' body as a'd like to see yer. But theer's mony people as du more harm nor good by goin' to sit wi' sick foak.' Nelly meekly admitted it; and then she suggested that she might be the bearer of anything Mrs. Backhouse would like to send her son--clothes, for instance? The old man thawed rapidly, and the three, Nelly, Tommy, and Father Time, were soon sincerely enjoying each other's society, when a woman in a grey tweed costume, and black sailor hat, arrived at the top of a little hill in the road outside the garden, from which the farm and its surroundings could be seen. At the sight of the group in front of the farm, she came to an abrupt pause, and hidden from them by a projecting corner of wall she surveyed the scene--Nelly, with Tommy on her knee, and the old labourer who had just shouldered his scythe again, and was about to go on his way. It was Bridget Cookson, who had been to Kendal for the day, and had walked over from Grasmere, where the char-à-banc, alias the 'Yellow Peril,' had deposited her. She had passed the Post Office on her way, and had brought thence a letter which she held in her hand. Her face was pale and excited. She stood thinking; her eyes on Nelly, her lips moving as though she were rehearsing some speech or argument.