"Why, Jael, my poor girl, what IS the matter?"

"I don't know, miss. But I feel very unked."

"'Tis no fault of yourn, miss," said Jael, rustic, but womanly.

No reply, but two clear eyes began to fill to the very brim.

Grace coaxed her, and said, "Speak to me like a friend. You know, after all, you are not my servant. I can't possibly part with you altogether; I have got to like you so: but, of course, you shall go home for a little while, if you wish it very, very much."

"Indeed I do, miss," said Jael. "Please forgive me, but my heart feels like lead in my bosom." And, with these words, the big tears ran over, and chased one another down her cheeks.

Then Grace, who was very kind-hearted, begged her, in a very tearful voice, not to cry: she should go home for a week, a fortnight, a month even. "There, there, you shall go to-morrow, poor thing."

Now it is a curious fact, and looks like animal magnetism or something, but the farm-house, to which Jael had felt so mysteriously drawn all night, contained, at that moment, besides its usual inmates, one Henry Little: and how he came there is an important part of this tale, which I must deal with at once.