Mistress Huntoon watched Peggy closely as she spoke Romney's name, but no answering blush marked her words. The girl was so utterly worn out that she scarcely took any heed of what was passing around her, but sank upon the bed, closed her eyes, and dropped into sweet slumber to the sound of a tender, preoccupied crooning of the old refrain,—the same that Romney had hummed to himself on the hillside path at St. Mary's,—
"Heigh-ho! whether or no,
Kiss me once before you go
Under the trees where the pippins grow."
In her dreams it seemed to Peggy that she was standing on a ladder in an English orchard. Romney was shaking the tree and for every apple that fell claiming a kiss, while she from her vantage ground of the ladder pelted him with the red apples instead.
The dream brought a smile to the pale young lips.
"It is well," said Mistress Huntoon to herself, watching her; "she sleeps and she smiles. Youth will do the rest." After bending an instant over the sleeper she left her and slipped down the staircase into the hall. Romney was walking up and down. At the foot of the stairway he met his mother and kissed her hand, as had been his custom from babyhood. They crossed the hall and sat down side by side on the wide settle before the fire.
Then a silence fell between them.
"Alas," thought the mother, "when did ever my boy find it hard to speak with me before?"