After tea we all sat round the fire together—the thought, I know, was still in Pierson's mind and mine—whether it was in Tom's or not, I don't know, for he didn't say anything. Only we were all tired and dull, and Racey climbed up on to Pierson's knee, and told her he would go away to the country with her—"London was such a ugly place." And Pierson sighed, and said she wished he could. And then she began telling us about the village in the country, that was her home, and where she was going back again to live, when she was married to Harding, who was the blacksmith there. Her father had been a farmer but he had died, and her mother was left very poor, and with several children. And Pierson was the eldest, and couldn't be married to Harding for a long time, because she had to work for the others, so perhaps it was all her troubles that had made her grumpy. But now all the others were settled—some were in America and some were "up in the north," she said. We didn't know what that meant—afterwards Tom said he thought it meant Iceland, and Racey thought it meant the moon, but we forgot to ask her. So now Pierson was going at last to be married to Harding.
"Is he all black?" I remember Tom asked.
"All black, Master Tom," Pierson said, rather indignantly. "Of course not—no blacker than you or me, though perhaps his hands may be brown. But once he's well cleaned of the smoke and the dust, he's a very nice complexion for a working man. Whatever put it in your head that he was black?"
"'Cause you said he was a blacksmith," said Tom, "and I thought it was something like a sweep, and sweeps never can get white again, can they? It says so in the Bible."
I burst out laughing. "He means about the Ethiopian," I said, but Pierson didn't laugh. That was one of the things I didn't like about her. She never could see any fun in anything, and she still looked rather offended at Tom. "All black," she repeated. "What an idea!"
I tried to put her in a good humour again by asking her to tell us about her house. It was a very pretty cottage, she said, next door to the smithy, but of course a different entrance, and all that.
"Has it roses on the walls?" I asked, and "Yes," Pierson replied. "Beautiful roses—climbing ones of all colours. And there's a nice little garden in front. It's a very pretty cottage, but most of the cottages in our village are pretty. It's a real old-fashioned village, Miss Audrey—I would like you to see it—it's not so very far from London."
"Will you go there in the same railway we came in?" asked Tom.
"Oh no," said Pierson, "it's quite the other way from Elderling."—Elderling was our old home. "It's only two hours and a half from town, by express. You go to Coppleswade Junction, and then it's a walk of five miles to Cray—that's the name of the village, and Coppleswade's the post-town."
"Perhaps," said I, "perhaps some time we'll come and see you, Pierson."