But though there were so many, there was no fear that the feast would run short, for the tables were heaped up with bread and butter and cakes, and fruit, and tea and sugar, and there were pails of milk standing under the trees, and more bread, and more fruit, and more of everything. It was settled that when Miss Darwell came, the feast was to begin.
"Oh!" cried Lucy, "how pleasant everything looks!"
There was not time for any more to be said, for the carriage was getting close to the tents; it stopped, and Mrs. Colvin and the young people alighted.
Miss Darwell was received by many smiling faces; every child looked at her with innocent delight, and the women murmured, "Bless her sweet face!" And then orders were given that the feast was to begin, and the people settled themselves on the grass in small parties.
Mrs. Colvin having given Miss Darwell a hint, she went to speak to Mrs. Burke, and invited her and her daughters to come and assist in serving the people, and seeing that everyone had as much as they wished.
Kind Mrs. Burke was the very person to like to be asked to do such a thing, and the Misses Burke could not be offended when they saw Miss Darwell as busily engaged as she possibly could be.
"Now," said she to Lucy, and Emily, and Henry, "now you are to come with me; look at that little party under that oak; there is a very old woman and two children. There are more people near, but I don't want you to look at them—come close to them." And they all four walked towards them.
"Do not stir, do not speak," said Miss Darwell, to the two children and the old woman; "let Master and the Misses Fairchild see if they recognise you again."
The little ones under the tree entered into the joke, and sat quite still. The boy, indeed, laughed and chuckled; but the little girl kept her countenance. The old woman did not know Mr. Fairchild's children, so she had no trouble to keep herself from smiling.
All these three were neatly dressed, and their clothes looked quite new. The boy had a suit of what is called hodden-gray, with a clean shirt as white as the snow.