Edith could not help saying pathetically, "Oh, dear! I'm so sorry." Arden then added hastily, "But it's a kind of a pretty place too--a great many fruit-trees and grapevines on it." "So I've been told," said Edith. "And that will be its chief attraction to me." "Then you are going to live there?" "Yes." Arden's heart gave a sudden throb. Then he would see this mysterious stranger often. But he smiled half bitterly in the darkness as he queried, "What will she appear like in the daylight?" Her next question broke the spell he was under utterly. They were passing through the village and the little hotel was near, and she naturally asked: "To whom am I indebted for all this kindness? I am glad to know so much as that you are my neighbor." Suddenly and painfully conscious of his outward life and surroundings, he answered briefly: "My name is Arden Lacey. We have a small farm a little beyond your cottage." Wondering at his change of tone and manner, Edith still ventured to ask: "And do you know of any one who could bring my furniture and things up to-morrow?" As he sometimes did that kind of work, an impulse to see more of her impelled him to say: "I suppose I can do it. I work for a living." "I am sure that is nothing against you," said Edith kindly. "You will not live long in Pushton before learning that there is something against us," was the bitter reply. "But that need not prevent my working for you, as I do for others. If you wish, I will make a fire in your house early, to take off the chill and dampness, and then go for your furniture. The people here will send you out in a carriage." "I shall be greatly obliged if you will do so and let me pay you." "Oh, certainly, I will charge the usual rates." "Well, then, how much for to-night?" said Edith as she stood in the hotel door. "To-night is another affair," and he jumped into his wagon and rattled away in the darkness, his lantern looking like a "will-o'-the-wisp" that might vanish altogether. The landlord received Edith and her attendant with a gruff civility, and gave her in charge of his wife, who was a bustling red-faced woman with a sort of motherly kindness about her. "Why, you poor child," she said to Edith, turning her round before the light, "you're half drowned. You must have something hot right away, or you'll take your death o' cold," and with something of her husband's faith in whiskey, she soon brought Edith a hot punch that for a few moments seemed to make the girl's head spin, but as it was followed by strong tea and toast, she felt none the worse, and danger from the chill and wet was effectually disposed of. As she sat sipping her tea before a red-hot stove, she told, in answer to the landlady's questions, how she had got up from the boat. "Who is this Lacey, and what is there against them?" she asked suddenly. The hostess went across the hall, opened the bar-room door, and beckoned Edith to follow her.