Pushing open the one to the right, which stood ajar and yielded at once to her touch, Ruth lifted a curtain of tapestry hanging on its inner side, and entered a spacious oak-wainscoted chamber, whose handsome but old-fashioned and well-worn furniture showed dimly in the light of the log-fire burning on the hearth. "Yes," she said, at last answering the old woman's question. "He was down by the bridge." "That's well," said Maudlin, heaving a sigh of relief, as she sank into a big comfortable armed chair beside the hearth, "for he seemed main put about that you tarried so late. Tho', as I said to him: 'Tis but once in our lives we're young, Master Rumbold,' I said. And have you had a good time of it, dear heart? Marry! you've been as blithe as a cricket, I'll warrant; and Master Lee, did he row thee along home in his boat, lady-bird?" "Of course he did," replied Ruth, stooping down over the hearth, and busying herself with mending the fire with the stray bits of smouldering log. "Of course he did," mimicked Maudlin, her little bead-black eyes twinkling merrily. "Marry, come up! Hark at that now! And left Madam Lee, poor lady, to entertain her company as she might! That's what comes o being Queen o' May. Heigho! When douce King Jamie, as his own Scots folk used to call him, sat on his gold throne," went on Maudlin, spreading her withered hands out in the brightening blaze and looking hard into it, "they made May Queen o' me. Well, well, and Master Lawrence is gone home again now--eh, child?" "No," said Ruth, with a slight start. "Oh, yes--I mean no--I mean--that is, how should I know?" "How should you know?" echoed Maudlin testily; "because you've got eyes and ears, I suppose. Is the child gone silly?" "It's you're silly," retorted Ruth crossly, "asking such stupid questions;" and then she, too, set to staring moodily into the fire. "Fretty!" inwardly commented the old nurse, as she stole a cornerwise glance at Ruth's pale face. "Fretty as any teazle burr. And 'tisn't once in a six month she's that, poor dear. Tired out; that's what 'tis. As tired out, I'll warrant, with her bit o' pleasurin' as ever our old Dobbin is with his plough work, and as ready as he is for his feed o'--What'll you like for supper, lady-bird?" "Nothing." "Eh, naught's a sorry supper indeed. Naught? when there's syllabub sweet as your own Colley's milk can make it; and the hot-spiced cake"-- "Ah! how you do plague! I'm not a bit hungry. It's been eat, eat, eat, all day down at the Hall," said Ruth, still half cross, and yet half apologizing for her most unusual shortcoming. "Madam Lee is main an' hospitable, to be sure," said Maudlin, "and likes folks, rich and poor, to be havin' their fill. God bless her!" "Ay," nodded Ruth, and a faint smile of pleasure flitted across her grave face. "And poor old Maudlin," slyly went on the old nurse, "would a'most be finding it in her heart to be jealous of her, if she wasn't quite sure--"