"Rain!" exclaimed Matthew, as his wife closed the door on her visitor. "Who'd have thought it? But there, she said it would rain. Oh! she's a true prophet, is Goody Grey, and no mistake. I said she was a fearful 'ooman, and know'd most everything. The Lord save and deliver us, and have mercy upon us! for we none of us know," and he glanced at Mrs. Marks, "what's going to happen. Good Lord deliver us from harm."
"There go and put the pot on to boil for supper," said Mrs. Marks, turning on him sharply, "and don't stand there a chaunting of the psalms'es."
And with deep sighs and many inward groans, Matthew went and did his wife's bidding, but the psalms seemed uppermost in his mind that night; he seemed to have them at his fingers' ends.
CHAPTER II.
A FRIENDLY INTERFERENCE.
"No tears, Celia, now shall win My resolv'd heart to return; I have searched thy soul within, And find nought but pride and scorn; I have learn'd thy arts, and now Can disdain as much as thou." Carew.
Men fall in love every day, yet few of them like to be caught talking or acting sentimentally towards the object of their affections.
Charles was inwardly vexed at Frances' sudden appearance, and still more so at the sarcastic way in which she had spoken and acted. What business was it of hers to take either himself or Miss Neville to task? Was it not partly his fault the wrist was sprained, and would he not have been wanting in common politeness had he, when he accidentally discovered it, not tried in some measure to remedy it?