She felt this difference more with Charlie than the others, for John Shelley’s piety made her look up to him with reverence; and Mrs. Shelley’s sound common sense and true motherly kindness had won her respect and affection; but Charlie, fond as she was of him, was rather a trial to Fairy. His thick hobnailed shoes which he persisted in wearing in the house, his smock-frock, to which, on the shepherd, Fairy had no objection, for, as she often said, he looked like one of the old patriarchs in it, but Charlie’s smock was by no means becoming; he looked what he was—a clodhopping youth in it; his dirty stained hands, which no amount of washing could ever make clean, his broad, Sussex brogue, and his habit of chucking at his forelock if he met Mr. Leslie, were thorns in the flesh to Fairy, as they had been to Jack; and certainly there was no danger of her ever feeling or evincing more than a sisterly affection for the bucolic Charlie. No wonder if Fairy, feeling lonely when Jack was gone, took to remaining oftener at the rectory, after her lesson hours were over, than she had done when he was at home, particularly as she was a great favourite there, not only with the young people, who could do nothing without Fairy, but with Mr. and Mrs. Leslie also, both of whom had come to be very fond of her. They pitied her, too, knowing well the difficulties of her position, though Fairy was much too loyal to the Shelleys to speak of them; and they were anxious to help her as far as lay in their power. At present all they were able to do was to give her the same advantages of education as they bestowed on their own four plain daughters. Unluckily, Fairy did not show any great fondness for study, though she readily learnt French and music, and any accomplishments, for she was very clever with her fingers, and both painted and played very well, for those days. What was to become of Fairy in the future was a problem which often exercised Mr. and Mrs. Leslie’s brains, and the only solution they could arrive at was that Jack must make his fortune in America, and come back and marry her, since it was quite clear she could not live for ever with the shepherd; neither was she fitted to be a governess; and there was no other way of well-educated women earning their living in those days, and there would be some insurmountable obstacles to marrying her to any one else. A gentleman would hesitate at marrying a girl brought up in a peasant’s cottage, and it was quite certain Fairy would not marry anyone but a gentleman, unless, indeed, she took Jack; so, after due consideration, Mr. and Mrs. Leslie settled there was no other future open to her.