"Ob, mother, we rode in a trap all the way—such a long way—and the horse went so slow!" Lily was explaining. "And the men said there was the little girl as was lost and her folks was looking for her; but Mr. Bland said it didn't matter now she was found. Mother, where's John?"
"I don't know, my precious. Go and look for him; he's wearying for you," said Mrs. Randal tenderly. "He's in the forge or the garden, maybe. Now, Mr. Bland, you're welcome indeed. Please to sit down. You've brought back the sunshine to our house, sir. John's well-nigh distracted over losing that child."
"That was only to be expected," said the schoolmaster, sitting down in John's chair. "And now I should like to know how she got lost, for her story was difficult to understand. Knowing John's views, I was surprised that she ever found herself at Carsham on fair-day."
"No wonder," said Mrs. Randal with a sigh. "You couldn't be more surprised than I was. Mary Alfrick took her to the fair."
"Did she really? Are you sure of that?"
"As sure as we can be. Ah, that's half my grief, and a half that can't be mended, Mr. Bland. The best girl and the faithfullest and steadiest girl for miles round. Well, you know the name she had in this country for being superior. Ever since my John got engaged to her, I've felt that his future life was safe to be all right and happy, and I've left off fretting over leaving him, as I must some day—a day not far off, too, for I'm not the woman I was. Well, Mr. Bland, those two have quarrelled over this business of the fair, and of losing Lily. They've had words—John told me himself—and all's over between them."
Mrs. Randal's voice was choked by tears.
"My dear friend," said Mr. Bland, "I'm most sincerely sorry to hear what you tell me. And you think this melancholy split is quite beyond mending?"
Mrs. Randal nodded and shook her head; she could not speak.
"'Life is thorny, and youth is vain,'" muttered the schoolmaster, who was well read in the poets. "Thus we break in an instant what we would give our lives to repair. But I cannot reconcile the child's own story with what you have told me, Mrs. Randal. She described herself as going to the fair with other children. She told me that Mrs. Alfrick—not Miss, or Mary—had sent her out of the theatre because she was frightened—that she and another child had then danced to an organ, after which she was decoyed away by the people from whom my wife and I recovered her."