She replied with a question, put timidly.
"You've knowed her a good bit, I dare say, my dear?"
"No," uneasily. "A six-month or so, that's all."
"But it's been long enough for her to find out that what I said to her was true. I didn't tell her what was new to her, my dear. I see that by her smile, an' the kind way she listened. She's got a beautiful smile, Jem, an' a beautiful sweet face."
When they parted for the night, he drew from his pocket a bank-note and handed it to her.
"I've been thinking," he said, awkwardly, "that it would be in your line to give summat now and then to some o' the poor lot that's so thick here. There's plenty on 'em, an' p'r'aps it wouldn't be, a bad thing. There's not many that's fond of givin'. Let's set the gentry a fashion."
"Jem!" she said. "My dear! there isn't nothin' that would make me no happier—nothin' in the world."
"It won't do overmuch good, may be," he returned. "More than half on 'em don't deserve it, but give it to 'em if you've a fancy for it. I don't grudge it."
There were tears of joy in her eyes. She took his hand and held it, fondling it.
"I might have knowed it," she said, "an' I don't deserve it for holdin' back an' feel in' a bit timid, as I have done. I've thought of it again and again, when I've been a trifle lonesome with you away. There's many a poor woman as is hard-worked that I might help, and children too, may be, me bein' so fond of 'em."
She drew nearer still and laid her hand on his arm.
"I always was fond of 'em," she said, "always—an' I've thought that, sometimes, my dear, there might be little
