‘“Prettier than she?”
‘What Tony would have said to that nobody knows, for before he could speak, what should he see ahead, over the hedge past the turning, but a feather he knew well—the feather in Milly’s hat—she to whom he had been thinking of putting the question as to giving out the banns that very week.
‘“Unity,” says he, as mild as he could, “here’s Milly coming. Now I shall catch it mightily if she sees ’ee riding here with me; and if you get down she’ll be turning the corner in a moment, and, seeing ’ee in the road, she’ll know we’ve been coming on together. Now, dearest Unity, will ye, to avoid all unpleasantness, which I know ye can’t bear any more than I, will ye lie down in the back part of the waggon, and let me cover you over with the tarpaulin till Milly has passed? It will all be done in a minute. Do!—and I’ll think over what we’ve said; and perhaps I shall put a loving question to you after all, instead of to Milly. ’Tisn’t true that it is all settled between her and me.”
‘Well, Unity Sallet agreed, and lay down at the back end of the waggon, and Tony covered her over, so that the waggon seemed to be empty but for the loose tarpaulin; and then he drove on to meet Milly.
‘“My dear Tony!” cries Milly, looking up with a little pout at him as he came near. “How long you’ve been coming home! Just as if I didn’t live at Upper Longpuddle at all! And I’ve come to meet you as you asked me to do, and to ride back with you, and talk over our future home—since you asked me, and I promised. But I shouldn’t have come else, Mr. Tony!”
‘“Ay, my dear, I did ask ye—to be sure I did, now I think of it—but I had quite forgot it. To ride back with me, did you say, dear Milly?”
‘“Well, of course! What can I do else? Surely you don’t want me to walk, now I’ve come all this way?”
‘“O no, no! I was thinking you might be going on to town to meet your mother. I saw her there—and she looked as if she might be expecting ’ee.”
‘“O no; she’s just home. She came across the fields, and so got back before you.”
‘“Ah! I didn’t know that,” says Tony. And there was no help for it but to take her up beside him.