Priscilla wondered at the sudden bitterness in her voice, then remembered that this was Peggy’s mother; and the widow knew, it was plain, that she was her daughter’s rival. Tears of pride and humiliation started to the girl’s eyes. It was easier to conquer a secret trouble than an open one. “Well, to shorten a sad tale,” went on the older woman, after seeing that her taunt had struck home, “Mr. Gaunt turned both mother an’ th’ little lad out into th’ cold; an’ I could have throttled him for ’t, if he’d been a thought less strong. The rest o’ the tale ye know, Miss Cilla. They found the mother dead on the door-stone, an’ Billy the Fool war strong enough to weather the cold--else he’d not have been here at the drinking-pool to-day.” Cilla gathered her strength again. “Why do you tell me this?” she asked. “I say, with father, that one day’s trouble is enough as it comes, without going back to the old sorrows.” “Why, lile baby? Because I’ve watched ye an’ Gaunt go lover-like along the pastures, afore this daft snow came. Because I want to warn ye that Gaunt comes of a bad breed, an’ never i’ this world could be aught but a will-o’-wispie. Oh, my lass, I’ve seen a few springs come--but I’ve seen the end o’ such-like nonsense, and I know.” Cilla laughed, and Widow Mathewson, whose outlook on the world was impersonal and cold--save when human weakness broke down the barriers--approved this slim lass in her workaday dress of homespun. “It was only yesterday that I bade Mr. Gaunt marry where his heart lay,” said the girl quietly. “If I had cared for him--after that fashion--should I have been glad when he told me he was marrying Peggy?” “You were glad?” asked the widow, with suspicion. “Why not? He is fond of Peggy, and I think that--that he will settle down, as a farmer should--” “Ay, so I think, too,” broke in the widow with sudden feeling. “I made the worst o’ that bygone tale, I own, and never told ye that Reuben, on that night when he’d been plaguing me i’ the kitchen, crept round into t’ hall, listening to the stranger-woman’s tale and seeing her driven out into the wind. Well, he waited for his father to go, and then he crept to my side, did th’ lad, an’ we listened to her as she ligged, crying, just outside th’ door. Then he pulled up th’ sneck, an’ he war lifting her in when old Gaunt came, all thunder and lightning down th’ passage. Gaunt locked th’ stranger-woman and the lad out o’ doors; an’ he locked Reuben an’ me i’ th’ big, up-stairs room. ’Twas so we passed the night, Miss Cilla, but I’ve a soft spot i’ my heart for th’ lad ever since, spite of his cantrips.” They looked across the pool at each other. They were set about by snow, and moaning of the wind, and white hills shrouded under mists that made their summits level with the sky. “What chance had he?” said Cilla. “With such a father--oh, he did well that night! He did well.”