Page:Mistress Madcap Surrenders (1926).pdf/62

 "Think ye Cousin Eliza will have secured invitations as yet to any o' the dances?" queried Mehitable, endeavoring to smooth her tumbled black locks with mittened fingers, for even a moment's exposure to the air would have made them ache.

"An she has not, John or Captain Freeman will have done so," answered Charity rather mischievously. And laughed to see the blush that mantled Mehitable's cheek at the last name.

"Indeed, Mistress Smarty, I ha' not e'en heard o' Captain Freeman for a year or more, as ye very well know," retorted Mehitable. "Besides," she interrupted herself to say, "Captain Freeman thinks me yet a babe, I suppose!"

"Well, he would be right—were ye not but fifteen or sixteen when last he saw ye?" admitted Charity, far too quickly to suit Mehitable. "Of course, that was vastly young for twenty-one, Hitty!"

"Indeed, Mother was but sixteen when she was married!" Mehitable tossed her head.

"She says, now, 'twas much too young!" responded Charity promptly. She fell into a reverie, out of which she roused herself with a troubled face. "Hitty," she spoke tremulously, "I ha' been thinking over recently a fairy story Nancy once told me when I was a little girl, that time she did visit our house and she and John had had a quarrel. It was woven around hers and John's story, though,