“I promised not to be long away, and I ought to be on my road back again,” she said. “So good-bye, mother; good-bye, father.”
May put out her hand to Jacob, who pressed it in his own rough palm, casting a look at her, in which reverence was mingled with affection. Not noticing his glance she tripped lightly away.
He followed from the cottage, keeping, however, at some distance behind, till he had seen her enter the gate of Downside Cottage.
“What can have come over our Jacob,” said the dame, after he had gone.
“He looks of late as if he was afraid of our Maiden May, instead of being friendly with her, as he used to be. I suppose, as she seems a fine young lady, that it would not become him, a poor fisher-lad, to be talking to her as he did when she was a little girl,” observed Adam. “To be sure he does sometimes look curious, and often forgets things I tell him; however, he is as good a lad as ever, so I will say nothing agen him.”
Neither his father or mother knew the true cause of poor Jacob’s changed manner.