"Choppin' his words up an' mincin' 'em sma'. He's noan Lancashire, ony gowk could tell."
"I dunnot see as he minces so," said Joan roughly. "He dunnot speak our loike, but he's well enow i' his way."
A boisterous peal of laughter interrupted her.
"I thowt tha' ca'ed him a foo' a minute sin'," cried two or three voices at once. "Eh, Joan, lass, tha'st goin' t' change thy moind, I see."
The girl's eyes flashed.
"Theer's others I could ca' foo's," she said; "I need na go far to foind foo's. Foo' huntin's th' best sport out, an' th' safest. Leave th' engineer alone an' leave me alone too. It'll be th' best fur yo'."
She turned round and strode out of the group. Another burst of derisive laughter followed her, but she took no notice of it. She took no notice of anything—not even of the two men who at that very moment passed and turned to look at her as she went by.
"A fine creature!" said one of them.
"A fine creature!" echoed the other. "Yes, and you see that is precisely it, Derrick. 'A fine creature'—and nothing else."
They were the young engineer and his friend the Reverend Paul Grace, curate of the parish. There were never two men more unlike, physically and mentally, and yet it would have been a hard task to find two natures more harmonious and sympathetic. Still most people wondered at and failed to comprehend their friendship. The mild, nervous little Oxonian barely reached Derrick's shoulder; his finely cut face was singularly feminine and innocent; the mild eyes beaming from behind his small spectacles had an absent, dreamy look. One could not
