"Did you ever see a lady do that? You never did. You'll see me do things you've never seen a lady do. You'll see me---- But you've got to teach me first. You'll teach me, won't you? . . . You won't go away until you've taught me? You won't go away?" "You're the most extraordinary young woman I ever met in my life." "Did you come to uncle because of me?" "Eh?" He stared at her. The idea had not presented itself to him before. She was not going to allow him to escape it. "Did you come to uncle because of me?" He knew that it was so. "Yes," he said. "Hadn't we better go?" "Not yet." She was kneeling beside him mischievously tickling the back of his hand with a frond of bracken. "Not yet. Do you remember what you said to me that night?" "No. What did I say?" "You said you'd never been in love." "No more I have." "Come along then." The caravan hove in sight as they reached the gate. She joined Mrs. Copas inside, and he, Mr. Copas, on the footboard. He was filled with a bubbling humor and was hard put to it not to laugh aloud. He had no clear memory of the talk in the wood, but he liked the delicious absurdity of it. "In love?" he said to himself. "Nonsense." All the same he could not away with the fact that he had a new zest and pleasure in contemplating the future. Thrigsby and all its works fell away behind him and he was glad of his promise to teach the girl. . . . One girl after hundreds of boys! It had been one of his stock jests for public dinners in Thrigsby that the masters of the Grammar School and the mistresses of the High School should change places. No one had ever taken him seriously until now Fate had done so. Of course it could not last, this new kind of perambulatory school with one master and one pupil; the girl was too attractive; she would be snapped up at once, settle down as a wife and mother before she knew where she was. In his thoughts he had so isolated himself with her that old prejudices leaped up in him and gave him an uncomfortable sense of indiscretion. That, however, he placated with the reminder that, after all, they were chaperoned by Mrs. Copas. "That's a fine girl, your niece," he said to Mr. Copas. "Aye. A handsome bit o' goods. She says to me, she says, 'I want to be a nactress, uncle,' she says. And I says: 'You begin at the bottom, young lady, and maybe when you're your aunt's age you'll be doing the work your aunt does.' They tell me, Mr. Mole, that in London they have leading ladies in their teens. I've never seen the woman who could play leads under forty. . . . Good God! Hi! Carrie! Tildy!" Mr. Mole had fallen from the footboard, flat on his face in the road.