"Maggie--you don't say so," said her mother, half incredulously. "It can't be, for he's at Cambridge, and it's not post-day. What do you mean?" "He came this morning, mother, when I was down at the well; and we fixed that I was to speak to you; and he asked if he might come again for tea." "Dear! dear! and the milk all gone sour? We should have had milk of our own, if Edward had not persuaded me against buying another cow." "I don't think Mr. Buxton will mind it much," said Maggie, dimpling up, as she remembered, half unconsciously, how little he had seemed to care for anything but herself. "Why, what a thing it is for you!" said Mrs. Browne, quite roused up from her languor and her head-ache. "Everybody said he was engaged to Miss Erminia. Are you quite sure you made no mistake, child? What did he say? Young men are so fond of making fine speeches; and young women are so silly in fancying they mean something. I once knew a girl who thought that a gentleman who sent her mother a present of a sucking-pig, did it as a delicate way of making her an offer. Tell me his exact words." But Maggie blushed, and either would not or could not. So Mrs. Browne began again: "Well, if you're sure, you're sure. I wonder how he brought his father round. So long as he and Erminia have been planned for each other! That very first day we ever dined there after your father's death, Mr. Buxton as good as told me all about it. I fancied they were only waiting till they were out of mourning." All this was news to Maggie. She had never thought that either Erminia or Frank was particularly fond of the other; still less had she had any idea of Mr. Buxton's plans for them. Her mother's surprise at her engagement jarred a little upon her too: it had become so natural, even in these last two hours, to feel that she belonged to _him_. But there were more discords to come. Mrs. Browne began again, half in soliloquy: "I should think he would have four thousand a-year. He did not tell you, love, did he, if they had still that bad property in the canal, that his father complained about? But he will have four thousand. Why, you'll have your carriage, Maggie. Well! I hope Mr. Buxton has taken it kindly, because he'll have a deal to do with the settlements. I'm sure I thought he was engaged to Erminia." Ringing changes on these subjects all the afternoon, Mrs. Browne sat with Maggie. She occasionally wandered off to speak about Edward, and how favorably his future prospects would be advanced by the engagement. "Let me see--there's the house in Combehurst: the rent of that would be a hundred and fifty a-year, but we'll not reckon that. But there's the quarries" (she was reckoning upon her fingers in default of a slate, for which she had vainly searched), "we'll call them two hundred a-year, for I don't believe Mr. Buxton's stories about their only bringing him in seven-pence; and there's Newbridge, that's certainly thirteen hundred--where had I got to, Maggie?"