Soon I heard two sounds, cuckoo and a child mocking cuckoo; turning abruptly past a high jetto, as thin in the lower part as a needle, but towards the top breaking into mist which the sun made orange and purple and blue, I reached a tennis-court, where a girl danced, an odd pretty creature, with a pale face and ringlets so deeply hued that they might have been washed in blood. She was all alone, tripping round and round in a ring, first on one foot, then on the other, and singing to herself in baby language. The cuckoo marked time: at every note little mistress drew herself upright, clasped her hands, and cried _cookoo_, then continued her dance. I stood by in silence, till, as she passed for the third time, she lifted her eyes, showing how they were hazel and big. ‘Ah,’ she said in a proud fashion, ‘’tis not Humphreville! Day after day have I thought to see him. They said last summer he had flown away with the cuckoo, and I know that with the cuckoo he must return. It is lonely here with no playmates. Who are you?’ ‘Frank Shackerley. My father’s coach broke down, and I ran away.’ She held out a tapering brown hand, on whose marriage finger gleamed a golden ring. ‘And I am the most noble lady, the Lady Millicent Campion, wife to Sir Humphreville Campion.’ ‘You tease me,’ I said vexedly. ‘You are not nearly as old as I, so you cannot be a wife.’ The Lady Millicent came nearer, tears gathering in her eyes; she put her arm around my neck. ‘Dear heart,’ she murmured, ‘’tis true. I know not how it came, but in the summer Humphreville stayed here with his parents, and I was wedded to him. At night when I was put to bed they brought him to kiss me, and when I awoke in the morning he had gone with the cuckoo. Why does not he stay with me and keep house like other husbands?’ At this moment an elderly woman came through the yew archway: she leaped almost off her feet with surprise. ‘Bless us!’ she cried, ‘an elvling!’ And she caught little Millicent in her arms; but the child laughed and patted her cheeks. ‘Nurse Granmodè,’ she said, ‘Master Shackerley hath stole away from his friends to visit me. Put me down at once, for I must speak with him. At once, I say! Dear nurse, do!’ The woman obeyed, and Millicent came again to my side. ‘Now let us kiss, for you must go back to your people,’ she whispered. ‘’Tis very good to meet you. I shall often think of you when you are gone.’ She brought her smooth lips to mine, and kissed with evident delight. The nurse separated us. ‘Madam, your mother will be uneasy if we do not return now,’ she said. ‘The bell has rung: we must go at once.’ Her charge took up the seams of her green skirt, and made a courtesy, then with a strange grace walked quietly away. In some manner she made me feel that I was utterly unpolished in comparison: her gait--her way of speaking--might have been copied in courts.