"He first found out about me and his brother. And how d'you reckon? From Cora. His sharp eyes saw her father in her long before Nathan died. I've been to Hawk House since it came out. He was content that Cora had suffered so sharp, and said so." "He thinks a great deal of you and Heathman, however." Milly brought the tea at this moment and called Heathman and Rupert, who were smoking in the farmyard. They appeared, and Milly's baby was carried to join the company. Rupert showed the cup that his godfather had given to the child. The Baskervilles made it clear that they designed no change in their relations with Mrs. Lintern. A sharp estrangement had followed Ned's jilting, but that belonged to the past. Amity reigned, and Milly expressed regret at Mrs. Lintern's determination to leave Shaugh Prior in the following spring. "They'll both be gone--both girls," she explained, "and Heathman here haven't got no need of a wife yet, he says, so he and I shall find a smaller and a cheaper place than Undershaugh." "Cora will marry yet," foretold Rupert. "Third time's lucky, they say." "'Twill be the fourth time," corrected Milly. They ate and drank, and spoke on general subjects; then the Linterns prepared to start, and Priscilla uttered a final word to Hester before the younger people. "I thank you for letting the past go. There was but few mattered to me, and you were the first of them." They departed, and the Baskervilles talked about them. Behind her back, they spoke gently of Priscilla, and old Mrs. Baskerville revealed even a measure of imagination in her speech. "The worst was surely after he sank into his grave and the storm broke," said Hester. "To think she was standing there, his unknown, unlawful wife, yet a wife in spirit, with all a wife's love and all a wife's belief in him. To think that her ear had to hear, and her heart had to break, and her mouth had to be dumb. Gall and vinegar that woman have had for her portion these many days--yet she goes unsoured." "She's got a rare good son to stand by her," declared Rupert. "And so have I," murmured Milly, squeezing the baby who was sucking her breast. "And I've got four," answered Mrs. Baskerville. "Four brave boys--one on sea and three on land. Things be divided curious; but our part is to thank God for what we've got, and not worry because them that deserve more have so much less. That's His work, and the balance will swing true again in His own good time." Elsewhere, upon their journey home, the Linterns fell in with May. She was excited, and turned back and walked beside them for half a mile. "I'm just bursting with news," she said, "and I hope you haven't heard it."