"Not one that will care a cracked three-farthings!" was the answer.
"You do ill to say so—indeed you do!" said she, with just a touch of warmth in her tone. "You have many friends; you serve them ill to say they would not heed your going."
"Friends?" said he. "Yes, they will miss me at the shovel-board, or when there is one short at the catches."
"There be others than those," said she with some little hesitation.
"Who, then?" said he.
"You should know yourself," she answered. "Think you that Prudence, for one, will be careless as to your leaving the country?"
"Prudence?" said he, and he darted a quick glance at her. "Nay, I confess me wrong, then; for there is one that hath a gentle heart, and is full of kindness."
"Right well I know that—for who should know better than I?" said Judith. "As true a heart as any in Christendom, and a prize for him that wins it, I warrant you. If it be not won already," she added, quickly. "As to that, I know not."
They were now nearing the town—they could hear the dull sound of the mill, and before them was the church spire among the trees, and beyond that the gray and red huddled mass of houses, barns, and orchards.
"And when think you of going?" she said, after a while.