"From here to Pike's shop and back again, aunt?--I could do it in a short ten minutes," said unsuspicious Jane, fancying her aunt might be wanting to send her there. "It would take you longer, of course." "How did it happen then last night that it took you two hours and ten minutes?" demanded Miss Hallet. "You left here soon after half past seven, and you did not get back till close upon ten." The soft colour in Jane's face grew bright on a sudden. She held her work to the window, as though some difficulty had occurred in the cambric. "After buying the sugar, I went into the parlour to say good evening to Susan Pike, aunt. And then there came that dreadful outcry about Nancy Gleeson's poor burnt child." The truth, but not the whole truth. Miss Jane had stayed three minutes with Susan Pike; and the commotion about the child had occurred some two hours later. The intervening time she did not allude to, or account for. Miss Hallet, never thinking to inquire minutely into time, so far accepted the explanation. "If Nancy Gleeson's children had all been burnt, that's no reason why you should stay out all that while." "Nearly everybody was out, aunt. It was like a fair around the Nunnery gate." "You go off here; you go off there; pretty nigh every evening you dance out somewhere. I'm sure I never did so when I was a girl." "When it is too dusk to see to work and too soon to light the candle, a run down the cliff does no harm," returned Jane. "Yes, but you stay when once you are down. It comes of that propensity of yours for gossip, Jane. Once you get into the company of Susan Pike or that idle Patty Nettleby, you take as much thought of time as you might if all the clocks stopped still for you." Jane bent to bite off a needleful of cotton--by which her flushed face was hidden. "There you are! How often have I told you not to bite your thread! Many a set of teeth as good as yours has been ruined by it. I had the habit once; but my lady broke me of it. Use your scissors, and--Dear me! here's Miss Reene." Ethel came in. Jane stood up to receive her and to hear her message. The girl's face was shy, and her manner was very retiring. Ethel thought of what she had just heard; certainly Jane looked pretty enough to attract Mr. Harry Castlemaine. But the blue eyes, raised to hers, were honest and good; and Ethel believed Jane was good also. "Thank you: yes, I shall be glad to do the handkerchiefs for Mrs. Barclay," said Jane. "But I shall not be going into Stilborough for a week or so: I was there yesterday. And of course I should not begin them until I have finished Mrs. Castlemaine's." "Very well; I suppose Mrs. Barclay is in no particular hurry," said Ethel.