"But you have remained in this house; you surely have not been in the hut, at Mooseridge?"
"I have gone wherever uncle Chainbearer has gone, and shall go with him, so long as we both live. Nothing shall ever separate us again. His years demand this, and gratitude is added to my love. Frank might possibly do better than work for the little he receives; but he will not quit us. The poor love each other intensely!"
"But I have desired your uncle to use this house, and for your sake I should think he would accept the offer."
"How could he, and carry chain twenty miles distant? We have been here, occasionally, a few days at a time; but the work was to be done and it must be done on the land itself."
"Of course, you merely gave your friends the pleasure of your company, and looked a little to their comforts, on their return from a hard day's work?"
Dus raised her eyes to mine; smiled; then she looked sad, her under-lip quivering slightly; after which a smile that was not altogether without humor succeeded. I watched these signs of varying feeling with an interest I cannot describe; for the play of virtuous and ingenuous emotion on a lovely female countenance is one of the rarest sights in nature.
"I can carry chain," said the girl, at the close of this exhibition of feeling.
"You can carry chain, Ursula—Dus, or whatever I am to call you——"
"Call me Dus—I love that name best."
"You can carry chain, I suppose, is true enough—but, you do not mean that you have?"