“Well, I shouldn’t be here if I was, but to-morrow I may be,” he added, with cheerful malice. “I doubt, as it is, if I can get as far as Keta’s Well to-night. The drifts were six feet high up the road, so they tell me.” “There now! If ever I want a thing, and must have it, there’s sure to be a cross. Ay, just another cross. Widows, living lonely like and helpless, were meant to bear ’em, I reckon. I was going to ask you to bring--” For the first time in the history of Will, he did not wait for a wayside command. His feet and hands were half frozen; that mattered little; but his horses were in risk of catching a chill. “Gee-up, Captain,” he said. “I’ll bring it, bird cage, or eight-day clock, or what not, Widow, when the weather’s a shade milder.” Cilla heard the running shuffle of hoofs on frozen snow as the mail went past Good Intent. She was sitting in the firelight, and Hirst, just returned from bringing sheep down to the fold, was dozing by the hearth. “There’s the mail, father. ’Tis time we had a letter between us, surely.” “Eh, lile lass?” he asked, rousing himself, as he always did, at the sound of Cilla’s voice. “The mail has just passed. I was thinking a letter of some kind would be welcome.” “Were ye, now? I could have understood that better if--well, if somebody had been away fro’ Garth instead of biding at home.” Cilla winced under her father’s jovial pleasantry. She knew that he referred to Gaunt, and during these days of waiting and uncertainty she was sensitive to the least hint that they were free to care for each other. “Oh, it is only that news from outside is pleasant, father, when the snow shuts us in for so long together.” “Well, ye’ve got your wish,” said Hirst, rising lazily as a knock sounded on the outer door of the porch. “That’s Harry the Post, if I know a knock when I hear it.” Cilla waited with a pleasant feeling of expectancy, as her father opened the door. “Evening!” came Postman Harry’s gruff voice. “Just a lile letter fro’ Canada. ’Twill be fro’ David, as I said to myseln soon as ever I saw the writing and the mark. I’ll step in, after my round’s finished, and hear what news he gi’es ye.” This easy handling of the mail’s privacy, was one of Garth’s usual customs, and Hirst assented. “Ay, step in, Harry. News and a cup o’ summat warm--ye’ll need it, with all the snow ye’ve got to trudge through.” “All i’ the year’s work! I’ll be glad to hear news o’ David, I own. Terrible pitiful thing, as I says to Daniel just now while sorting my mail--terrible daft thing to think of a steady, straight set-up Garth man choosing to waste his time i’ them furrin parts. Garth’s good enough for me, though plague take her weather. Well, I must be trudging.”