"Where can we get clothes to dress up in?" asked Hetty.
"Farmer Dawson's son is going to bring them to me, and you will find yours in your room just at dusk. Hurry them on fast and I shall be waiting in the passage."
That evening two rather puny figures of an old man and woman were shown up into the school-room where Miss Davis was sitting alone, looking into the fire and thinking of her distant home. Hetty was supposed to be arranging her wardrobe in her own room, and the other girls were with their mother. The governess was enjoying the treat of an hour of leisure alone, when she was informed that Mr. and Mrs. Crawford from Oldtown, Sheepshire, wished to see her.
"Show them up," said Miss Davis, and waited in surprised expectation. "Who are they?" she thought; "I do not know the name. But any one from dear Sheepshire—ah, what a strange-looking pair!"
They were odd-looking indeed. Mark was tall enough to dress up as a man, and he wore a rough greatcoat, and a white wig, and spectacles. Hetty had little gray curls, and gray eyebrows under a deep bonnet, and was wrapped in a cloak with many capes. In the uncertain light their disguise was complete.
"I have not the pleasure—" began Miss Davis.
"No, you don't know us," said Mark, "but your friends do, and we know all about you. We were passing this way and have brought you a message from your mother."
"Indeed!" said Miss Davis, and her heart sank. A letter she had been expecting all the week had not arrived. Her mother was sick and poor. What dreadful thing had happened at home?
"Oh, she is not worse than usual," put in Hetty, in the shrill piping tone which she chose to give to Mrs. Crawford. "Don't be alarmed."
Miss Davis did not easily recover from her first shock of alarm. She remained quite pale, and Hetty wondered to see so much feeling in a person whom she had often thought to be almost a mere teaching-machine.