“’Twould suit me exactly,” said Mrs. Todd. II. One can never be so certain of good New England weather as in the days when a long easterly storm has blown away the warm late-summer mists, and cooled the air so that however bright the sunshine is by day, the nights come nearer and nearer to frostiness. There was a cold freshness in the morning air when Mrs. Todd and I locked the house door behind us; we took the key of the fields into our own hands that day, and put out across country as one puts out to sea. When we reached the top of the ridge behind the town it seemed as if we had anxiously passed the harbor bar and were comfortably in open sea at last. “There, now!” proclaimed Mrs. Todd, taking a long breath, “now I do feel safe. It’s just the weather that’s liable to bring somebody to spend the day; I’ve had a feeling of Mis’ Elder Caplin from North Point bein’ close upon me ever since I waked up this mornin’, an’ I didn’t want to be hampered with our present plans. She’s a great hand to visit; she’ll be spendin’ the day somewhere from now till Thanksgivin’, but there’s plenty o’ places at the Landin’ where she goes, an’ if I ain’t there she’ll just select another. I thought mother might be in, too, ’tis so pleasant; but I run up the road to look off this mornin’ before you was awake, and there was no sign o’ the boat. If they hadn’t started by that time they wouldn’t start, just as the tide is now; besides, I see a lot o’ mackerel-men headin’ Green Island way, and they’ll detain William. No, we’re safe now, an’ if mother should be comin’ in to-morrow we’ll have all this to tell her. She an’ Mis’ Abby Martin’s very old friends.” We were walking down the long pasture slopes towards the dark woods and thickets of the low ground. They stretched away northward like an unbroken wilderness; the early mists still dulled much of the color and made the uplands beyond look like a very far-off country. “It ain’t so far as it looks from here,” said my companion reassuringly, “but we’ve got no time to spare either,” and she hurried on, leading the way with a fine sort of spirit in her step; and presently we struck into the old Indian footpath, which could be plainly seen across the long-unploughed turf of the pastures, and followed it among the thick, low-growing spruces. There the ground was smooth and brown under foot, and the thin-stemmed trees held a dark and shadowy roof overhead. We walked a long way without speaking; sometimes we had to push aside the branches, and sometimes we walked in a broad aisle where the trees were larger. It was a solitary wood, birdless and beastless; there was not even a rabbit to be seen, or a crow high in air to break the silence.