"I was wondering if I'd see you," he said; "was you tired yesterday? It's a fine day to-day." "Isn't it glorious!" she returned, blinking at the pale clear sun. "It makes everything look a heap prettier, doesn't it? Even this country that looks like as if it had had all the colour washed out of it in strong soda and suds." "Yes," she said. And then he spoke of yesterday's trade--he had done well; and of the round he had to go to-day. But he did not offer her a lift. "Won't you give me a drive to-day?" she asked suddenly. "I enjoyed it so much." "_Will_ you?" he cried, his face lighting up as he moved to arrange the sacks. "I didn't like to offer. I thought you'd think I was takin' too much on myself. Come up--reach me your hand. Right oh!" The cart clattered away. "I was thinking ever since yesterday when I see you how is it you can think o' so many words all at once. It's just as if you was seeing it all--the way you talked about the red barns and the grey gates and all such." "I _do_ see it," she said, "inside my mind, you know. I can see it all as plainly as I see these great cruel hills." "Yes," said he, "that's just what they are--they're cruel. And the fields and woods is kind--like folks you're friends with." She was charmed with the phrase. She talked to him, coaxing him to make new phrases. It was like teaching a child to walk. He told her about his home. It was a farm in Kent--"red brick with the glorydyjohn rose growin' all up over the front door--so that they never opened it." "The paint had stuck it fast," said he, "it was quite a job to get it open to get father's coffin out. I scraped the paint off then, and oiled the hinges, because I knew mother wouldn't last long. And she didn't neither." Then he told her how there had been no money to carry on the fruit-growing, and how his sister had married a greengrocer at Buxton, and when everything went wrong he had come to lend a hand with their business. "And now I takes the rounds," said he; "it's more to my mind nor mimming in the shop and being perlite to ladies." "You're very polite to _me_," she said. "Oh, yes," he said, "but you're not a lady--leastways, I'm sure you are in your 'art--but you ain't a regular tip-topper, are you, now?" "Well, no," she said, "perhaps not that." It piqued her that he should not have seen that she _was_ a lady--and yet it pleased her too. It was a tribute to her power of adapting herself to her environment. The cart rattled gaily on--he talked with more and more confidence; she with a more and more pleased consciousness of her perfect tact. As they went a beautiful idea came to her. She would do the thing thoroughly--why not? The episode might as well be complete. "I wish you'd let me help you to sell the things," she said. "I should like it." "Wouldn't you be above it?" he asked. "Not a bit," she answered gaily. "Only I must learn the prices of things. Tell me. How much are the herrings?"