He drew in his breath sharply, and turned away his eyes, and for several minutes neither of them spoke again. Ruth began unconsciously to put two and two together. She had heard of such things--read of them in books. Fate was often very cruel to the most deserving. Unlikelier things had happened. Dorothy was exceedingly pretty, and since her accident she had revealed traits of character that scarcely anyone suspected before. Ralph had been thrown into very close contact at the most impressionable part of his life. He had succoured her when she was hurt, carried her in his arms all the way from Treliskey Plantation to the cross roads. Nor was that all. She had discovered him after his accident, and when the doctor arrived on the scene, he was lying with his head on her lap. If he had learned to love her, it might not be strange, but it would be an infinite pity, all the same. The cruel irony of it would be too sad for words. Of course, he would get over it in time. The contempt he felt for Sir John, the difference in their social position, and last, but not least, the fact that she had been effectually banished from Hamblyn Manor, and that there was no likelihood of their meeting again, would all help him to put her out of his heart and out of his life. Nevertheless, if her surmise was correct, that Dorothy Hamblyn had stolen his heart, she could quite understand him saying that he did not intend to marry. "Poor Ralph!" she said to herself, with a sigh. And then she began to talk about the things that would be needed in their new home. Ruth had saved almost the whole of her nine months' wages, which, added to what Ralph had saved, made quite a respectable sum. To lay it out to the best advantage might not be easy. She wanted so many things that he saw no necessity for, while he wanted things that she pronounced impossible. On the whole, however, they had a very happy time in spending their savings and getting the little cottage in order. Everything, of course, was of the cheapest and simplest. They attended most of the auction sales within a radius of half a dozen miles, and some very useful things they got for almost nothing. Both of them were in the best of spirits. Ruth looked forward with great eagerness to the time of her release from service; not that she was overworked, while nobody could be kinder to her than her mistress. Nevertheless, a sense of servitude pressed upon her constantly. She had lived all her life before in such an atmosphere of freedom, and had pictured for herself a future so absolutely different, that it was not easy to accommodate herself to the straitened ways of service.