“Well, that beats all!” commented the shepherd. “There she do look I in the face so innocent as a baby, and she do sing out like a—like a angel. I can’t make nothing of it—nay, I can’t indeed.” His hut had now been put into position, and he occupied it that night, and might have slumbered peacefully enough, for his sheep were quiet; yet he could not rest for thinking of Ann-Car’line and her secret. “She mid ha’ found that watch,” he said to himself, “or she midn’t ha’ knowed ’twas wrong to take it. There, to think of it a-layin’ out there so as anybody what liked mid just stretch out his hand and take it. What ’ud the poor maid do then? She’d ha’ no chance of giving it back, or anything.” Impelled by these reflections, Timothy presently got up and made a second pilgrimage to Ann Car’line’s hiding-place. In a very few minutes he had withrawn the watch from its wrapper, dropped it into his own pocket, and replaced it by a round smooth stone. He chuckled to himself as he folded the handkerchief about this and laid it in the hole. “’Twill be a rare treat to see the maid’s face,” he said. For greater safety he continued to carry the watch about his person, carefully testing his pocket night and morning to make quite sure there was no suspicion of a hole. The knowledge of this possession made him look quizzically at Ann-Car’line when next he came upon her; and strange to say he found himself obliged to pass her house on the following day. She was busily engaged in scrubbing the doorstep, and on hearing his footfall turned round; and perceiving that he smiled, though somewhat oddly, smiled back, gaily and innocently enough. “Dear, to be sure!” exclaimed Timothy, pausing; “you do seem in very good spirits, my maid.” “Why, so I be,” replied the girl. “I han’t got nothing to make me sad, have I?” “I don’t suppose you have,” said Timothy. “You was a-singin’ yesterday so gay as a lark.” “Oh, I’m often singin’,” replied she. “I’d sing all day if I was let; it do help to pass the time away.” “You can’t sing and scrub, though, I shouldn’t think,” said Timothy, tentatively. “Can’t I?” retorted Ann-Car’line, and immediately dipped her brush in the pail and simultaneously lifted that marvellous clear voice of hers. It was a marvellous voice—fresh and true and ringing; she could send it up, up, to the very limit of the gamut, as it seemed, yet never lose sweetness or roundness. “Can’t I sing and scrub?” she repeated, pausing to take breath and to soap her brush afresh. “I never heerd nothin’ like it!” replied Timothy, enthusiastically. “Says I to myself yesterday, ‘It mid be a angel singin’,’ I says.” “Oh, and did you?” said Ann-Car’line, growing pink with pleasure as she vigorously polished the doorstep.