"Yes, I am," said Ellen, half-smiling.
"And you are come to make a visit to Miss Fortune, eh?"
"Yes," said Ellen, smiling no longer.
"And Miss Fortune han't come up to meet you! that's real shabby of her; and how to get you down there to-night, I am sure is more than I can tell." And he shouted, "Wife!"
"What's the matter, Mr. Forbes?" said a fat landlady, appearing in the doorway, which she filled near as well as her husband would have done.
"Look here," said Mr. Forbes "here's Morgan Montgomery's daughter come to pay a visit to her aunt Fortune Emerson. Don't you think she'll be glad to see her?"
Mr. Forbes put this question with rather a curious look at his wife. She didn't answer him. She only looked at Ellen, looked grave, and gave a queer little nod of her head, which meant, Ellen could not make out what.
"Now, what's to be done?" continued Mr. Forbes. "Miss Fortune was to have come up to meet her, but she ain't here, and I don't know how in the world I can take the child down there to-night. The horses are both out to plough, you know; and besides, the tire is come off that waggon-wheel. I couldn't possibly use it. And then it's a great question in my mind what Miss Fortune would say to me. I should get paid, I s'pose?"
"Yes, you'd get paid," said his wife, with another little shake of her head; "but whether it would be the kind of pay you'd like, I don't know."
"Well, what's to be done, wife? Keep the child overnight, and send word down yonder?"