"It is quite well, thank you," said Will, carefully studying his accent. "I hope," he added, taking off his hat and turning to Gwenda, who sat up interested, "I hope you are no longer suffering pain?"
"Very little, thank you. I am so glad your arm is well again, and I am glad to have this opportunity of thanking you."
And as Will prepared to withdraw again, lifting his hat and showing his tawny locks and his white teeth, Miss Vaughan placed her hand in his with a friendly good-bye.
The old colonel winced a little.
"I don't think you need have shaken hands with him, child; however, it was very nice of you, and I've no doubt it will please the young man very much. I declare he looks like a gentleman."
"And speaks like one," said Gwenda.
"Yes; pommy word I don't know what's the world coming to!"
"Very nice people those Vaughans, I should think," said Gwilym Morris, as he and Will tramped homewards in the evening.
"H'm! yes," said Will; "I daresay they thought they were honouring me very much by their notice; but, mind you, Gwilym, in a few years I'll show them I can hold up my head with any of them."
"Will," said Gwilym, after a pause, "I am afraid for you, lad; I am afraid of what the world will make of you. At Garthowen, with nothing but the simple country ways around us, we escape many temptations; but once we enter the world outside, even here in the market it reaches us, that subtle insidious glamour which incites us, not to become what we ought to be, but to appear different to what we are in reality."