When she had made a third row and filled them in she sighed a little. Before she had finished she had had to commandeer the whole of the bed, and was weary and confused. There seemed to be nothing but footprints all over it, and where the seed was, or how to make the earth look nice and smooth again so that no one should guess her secret, she was puzzled to know. She could have cried with weariness, but she bravely kept back her tears with the thought of the splendid thing she had done, and the delight and surprise there would be when her secret came to light. While she was standing looking in some dismay at the trampled bed, she remembered the rake standing in the corner. It was heavy, so heavy she could hardly carry it, and far too clumsy for her to wield properly, but she worked bravely, and tried to forget her aches; she had not a very critical eye either, and soon the bed, to her eyes, looked quite neat and tidy. Then came the crowning moment. At the water-tap, which stood over a butt sunk in the ground by one of the paths, she filled her new water-can, and proceeded to give her seeds a good watering. This was joy indeed, pure joy. The can poured splendidly, Poppy was delighted. She had to run many times to the tap to get water enough for the whole bed, and by the time it was done to her satisfaction her pinafore was well soaked, and she herself was almost too weary to stand. Her task was perfected, but when she looked down over herself, at her mud-clogged shoes, her dripping clothes, her begrimed hands, and realised what she would have to go through in the way of questioning and scolding, her spirits sank altogether. Cousin Charlotte or Anna she dared not face. Her only resource was to try to find Esther, or the others. They would scold too, but she knew them and their scoldings; they were not very bad, and were soon over. With the aid of the fork she managed to lift the latch of the garden door, and stepped out on the great wide waste; but in all the length and breadth of it, as far as her eyes could see, she caught no glimpse of the others. They were nowhere in sight, and the moor looked big, and lonely, and frightening. Poppy felt very forlorn, and miserable, and homesick, standing there in that great waste; and under the weight of her troubles her lip began to quiver, though she did her best to steady it. She dared not go indoors, and she was too weary to go in search of the others, so she crept up the slope to the nearest rocks large enough to hide her, determined to sit there and wait until she saw the others coming home, when she would call to them. She slipped off her pinafore, spread it on the ground to dry, and with much care and trouble cleaned first her hands and then her boots on the short coarse grass, after which, utterly weary, she lay down herself and knew no more. CHAPTER VII.