“Poor little girl,” he said, “alone in a new country, with such a lot of us whom she never heard of thrust upon her. I pity her by Jove!” CHAPTER XII. REINETTE AND MR. BERESFORD. Reinette slept heavily that first night in her new home—so heavily, that the robins had sung their first song, and the July sun had dried the dew-drops on the greensward and flowers before she awoke, with a very vague perception as to where she was, or what had happened to her. Through the window which she had left open came the warm summer air, sweet with the scent of clover and the newly-mown hay, which a farmer’s boy was turning briskly, not far from the house. And Reinette, who was keenly alive to everything fresh and beautiful, inhaled the delicious perfume and felt instinctively how much of freshness and beauty she was losing. But when she rose and, going to the window, threw back the shutters and looked for an instant at the lovely picture of the Merrivale hills and valleys spread out before her, a sharp cutting pain across her forehead and in her eyes warned her that her old enemy, the nervous headache, was upon her in full force, and there was nothing for her that day but pain and suffering in the solitude of her room. Then, as she remembered what Mrs. Ferguson had said of an early visit, for the sake of “talking over things,” she shuddered, and grew cold and faint, and thought, with that strange feeling of incredulity to which she clung: “If I were only positive and sure, beyond a doubt that mother did once pick huckleberries with Mrs. Jerry, and wear the cotton gown, I could bear everything so much better. Mr. Beresford knows all about it; he will tell me, and I must see him first, for _those people_ will not be long in coming to pay their respects. I’ll send Pierre immediately with a note asking him to come to me as soon as possible.” What Reinette willed to do she did at once, and in spite of the blinding pain in her head, she opened her desk and wrote as follows; “MR. BERESFORD:—I must see you. Come without delay. MISS HETHERTON.”