“Stole it!” ejaculated Ann-Car’line with a little scream. “I did no such thing. ’Twas give me, but I didn’t want to take it an’ I said I’d give it back—and now I can’t,” she added with a burst of woe. “Now look ye here, maidie,” cried Timothy, in a voice that had suddenly grown extremely wrathful, “this ’ere tale’s worse nor what I looked for. Who gave ye that watch? Come, make a clean breast on’t—else I’ll not lift a finger to help ye. It’ll have to come out first or last, and there’s less shame in telling me—what’s your friend—” “I’m not ashamed,” interrupted Ann-Car’line, throwing back her head. “I have not done wrong. ’Twas a gentleman give me the watch, there!” “Well, then you have done wrong!” said the shepherd, sternly. “What right had ye to take gold watches from gentlemen as ye dursen’t let your mother see. It bain’t a very nice story, that. Who is the gentleman?” he added fiercely. “What did he give ye the watch for?” Standing up to the hurdle he seized the girl by the wrists, pinioning her fast. “Lard, Timothy! Don’t pinch me so vicious—you be hurtin’ I. There, ’twas a actin’ gentleman what come wi’ a lot o’ others to the town in the summer. They was actin’ a play at the Corn Exchange, wi’ a lot o’ singin’ and dancin’ in it. This one was the head o’ the actin’ folks. I went there along o’ father, and he said he see’d me all the time the play was goin’ on—” “Your father said that?” queried Timothy, sharply. “No, the actin’ gentleman. He come upon me the next day, walkin’ along the lane and singin’—as I mid be the first day you did talk to I—and he did stop and speak.” “What did he say?” growled Timothy, tightening his grip upon her wrists. “Oh, he axed I a lot of questions, and he did say I wer’ a very pretty girl, and he did ax I would I like to be a fairy?” “It was him said that,” interrupted the shepherd. “I never thought there was a word o’ truth in the tale.” “There was, though. He meant a play-actin’ fairy, o’ course. He said all I’d have to do was to sing a bit, and dance a bit, and look nice, and I’d get a lot of money and see the world too.” “So he said, and what did you say?” asked Timothy, as she paused. “First I said I didn’t think mother could spare me, and then I said I didn’t think I’d like it, and then I said straight out I wouldn’t. But he wouldn’t take No,” said Ann-Car’line, opening her eyes very wide. “The more I hung back, the more he pressed—and at last he pulls out that watch an’ says he, ‘Now, my dear, think it over. We’ll be comin’ back again about Christmas-time,’ he says. ‘I’ll give you from now to then to make up your mind. And meanwhile there’s my watch for you to keep,’ says he—‘’twill show you I’m in earnest, anyhow. You can mark the flight of time with that,’ says he—he spoke so funny, ye know—‘and with every day that passes you must be the nearer to making up your mind to sayin’ Yes.’ Wasn’t it a queer notion?”