She found the winter very dreary without her, though.
CHARTER XCII.
Finding herself in good quarters, Annie re-engaged herself at the end of the half-year. She had spent the winter in house work, combined with the feeding of pigs and poultry, and partial ministrations to the wants of the cows, of which she had milked the few continuing to give milk upon turnips and straw, and made the best of their scanty supply for the use of the household. There was no hardship in her present life. She had plenty of wholesome food to eat, and she lay warm at night. The old farmer, who was rather overbearing with his men, was kind to her because he liked her; and the guidwife was a sonsy (well conditioned) dame, who, when she scolded, never meant anything by it.
She cherished her love for Alec, but was quite peaceful as to the future. How she might have felt had she heard that he was going to be married, I cannot take upon me to say.
When her work was done, she would go out for a lonely walk, without asking leave or giving offence, indulging in the same lawlessness as before, and seeming incapable of being restrained by other bonds than those of duty.
And now the month of April was nearly over, and the primroses were glintin' on the braes.
One evening she went out bare-headed to look how a certain den, wont to be haunted by wild-flowers and singing-birds, was getting on towards its complement of summer pleasures. As she was climbing over a fence, a horseman came round the corner of the road. She saw at a glance that it was Alec, and got down again.
Change had passed upon both since they parted. He was a full-grown man with a settled look. She was a lovely woman, even more delicate and graceful than her childhood had promised.
As she got down from the fence, he got down from his horse. Without a word on either side, their hands joined, and still they stood silent for a minute, Annie with her eyes on the ground, Alec gazing in her face, which was pale with more than its usual paleness.
"I saw Curly yesterday," said Alec at length, with what seemed to Annie a meaning look.