The place lay curiously, half in gold light, half in deep shadow. The stone chimney was standing, together with some portion of charred rafter. There were currant and gooseberry bushes, and a plum tree, but the bit of garden-hedge was broken down and all things had run to waste. Joan, drawing near, heard children’s voices, and presently, touching the cleared space, came into view of six or seven village boys, who, roaming at will or sent on some errand through the wood, had found here a resting-stage and fascination. They were after something—she thought a bird’s nest—in a crotch of the plum tree that brushed the blackened chimney. She stood and watched for a moment, then called to them. “Leave that poor bird alone!” Two or three, turning, laughed and jeered, and one small savage at the foot of the tree threw a stone. Joan was angry, but she could not help the bird—they probably had nest and eggs by now. She went on, past the burned cot, and was presently in the greenwood again. After a time she found herself upon the Oak Grange road, running across this corner of the forest. She had not meant to go this way, but a memory came to her of a stream flowing over pebbles, of an old house and an oak tree around which they used to say the fairies danced at night. She walked on upon the narrow and grass-grown road, and after a little time it led her out of the wood and to the edge of the pebbly stream. There was a footbridge thrown across, but she did not mean to go over to the other bank. She had no acquaintance at the Grange. She had heard Goodman Cole say that the old miser, Master Hardwick, was still alive, but was rarely seen without the house. Will the smith’s son had once worked at the Grange, but she did not know if he were there yet.... She sat down on a stone at this end of the bridge, and regarded now the old ruinous house sunk in ivy, with the long grass and ragged shrubs before it, and now the giant oak where the fairies danced, and now the bright blue sky behind with floating clouds, and now the shallow, narrow river with its pebbly shore, and now she regarded all in one. _Ripple, ripple!_ sang the water. She sat there some time, but at last, with a long breath, she stood up, looked a moment longer, then turned and, reëntering the wood, faced homeward. She had strolled and sauntered and spent her time. Now the sun was getting low in the west. Presently she left the road and took the forest track that would bring her again by the burned cot. Through the thinning wood she saw the place before her, in shadow now, except that the top of the plum tree was gold. She thought that she still heard the boys’ voices. Then, just at the edge of the clearing, she came suddenly face to face with a man.