"We shall know by an’ by what Red Ratcliffe has in mind," he muttered; "dost see him yonder, Martha, crossing th’ pasture? Ay, an’ now he’s following ’em up th’ wallside." "So he is. There’s no mistaking that red thatch o’ hisn—’twill set th’ sun afire one bonnie day, I’m thinking. Does he mean to do th’ Maister a hurt, think ye, Hiram?" Hiram stretched himself with the air of a man who has work to do. "He’s too far off yet for a pistol-shot; but he’s quickening pace a bit, an’ Lord knows what he’s bent on. I reckon I’ll just clamber ower th’ wall here, Martha, an’ wend down t’ other side, and get a word wi’ him as if ’twar chance like." "Tak care o’ thyseln, Hiram. There are some of us wod ill like to see harm come to thee." But Hiram was deaf to blandishments. He had gone far enough for one morning, and, all else apart, he was no whit sorry to slip out of temptation’s way. "There’s no telling when a Ratcliffe is about," he said, putting one leg over the low wall, "an’ th’ Maister is so throttle-deep i’ foolishness just now that he’s ripe-ready to fall into ony snare that’s laid for him. Begow, Martha, but I don’t know what th’ world wod come to if there war no Hiram Hey to straighten it now and again!" Martha sighed for the interrupted wooing as she lifted her pail from the stile. Hiram Hey moved surely, it might be, but life seemed short for such masterly painstaking slowness. "It’s war nor driving pigs to market, is getting Hiram to speak plain," she said to herself, setting off for home.—"Tha’ll be back to thy dinner, Hiram?" she added over her shoulder. "For sure I will. There’s more nor dinner to tempt me down to Marsh," he cried, his rashness gaining on him now that he stood on the far side of the wall. On no point save wedlock, however, did Hiram fail to know his purpose. He might have much to say about the young Master, but he had no mind to see harm come to him; and so he moved with a steady swing across the field, then turned sharp and crossed to the wall behind which Red Ratcliffe was creeping at a point some ten-score yards from the stile. He stopped then and leaned a pair of careless arms over the wall and looked everywhere but at the object of his manoeuvres, whose progress he had guessed to a nicety. "Why, is’t ye, Maister Ratcliffe?" he cried, letting his eyes fall at last on the tall, lean figure that stood not two yards away on the far side of the wall. Ratcliffe glanced at him, but could not guess whether Hiram’s stolid face hid any deeper thought than an idle wish to chatter. "’Tis I, plain enough," he growled. "Nay, doan’t fly at me—on a grand day like this, an’ all. I thowt mebbe ye’d stepped on to th’ Marsh land just to pick up a two-three wrinkles about farming. ’Tis not oft we’re favoured wi’ a sight o’ ye down here." "Dost think I need come here to learn any point of tillage?" laughed the other angrily.