Shortly after Peggy arrived with her mistress at the Keswick residence, her mind began to be a good deal disturbed.

She had been surprised, when the carriage drew up to the door, that "Mahs' Junius" had not rushed down to meet his intended bride, and when she found he was not in the house, and had, indeed, gone away from home, she did not at all know what to make of it.

If Miss Rob took the trouble to travel all the way to the home of the man that the Midbranch people had decided she should marry, it was a very wonderful thing, indeed, that he should not be there to meet her.

And while these thoughts were turning themselves over in the mind of this meditative girl of color, and the outgoing look in her eyes was extending itself farther and farther, as if in search of some solution of the mystery, up rode Mr Croft.
"Dar _he!_" exclaimed Peggy, as she stood at the corner of the house where she had been pursuing her meditations.

"He!" she continued in a voice that would have been quite audible to any one standing near.