It was with difficulty that the two visitors were able to take their leave that afternoon, and only the promise to come again and stay longer gave them liberty to go without hurting the feelings of these old friends. The little lad from Mackenzie had been dismissed long before, and it was Mr. Dick Goldsborough himself who insisted upon setting them upon their way. The dear old judge stood on the porch to wave a last farewell and to repeat his promise to look into the matter of Talbot plantations.
Linda wondered how it must seem to Miss Ri to be driving behind the horses of her former lover, himself holding the reins. She tried to place herself in a like position but when she attempted to replace Mr. Goldsborough in her mind with some other, two quite different persons would appear, and she could decide on neither.
Instead of going around by the old church they took the shorter way to the village which brought them to the borders of a stream where Mr. Goldsborough left them to be ferried across, thus saving some miles of travel. It was a very usual way of getting about in that part of the country where waterways were so numerous. From the old church at Talbot's Angles one could watch many of the congregation approaching in boats from the opposite shore of the creek, and when, before an approaching gale the tide would rise to cover the road, the little boats would be rowed in through the gateway half way up the path that they might land their passengers. It was therefore no novelty to be transported to the upper end of the village by means of the little boat, though it involved a walk down the long street to the lower end.
Miss Ri looked at her watch as they started on this walk. "It is earlier than I thought," she remarked. "The days are getting so short one cannot realize the time. The train doesn't leave till seven, and we have over an hour to spare. What shall we do with ourselves?"
"We don't want to go to the postoffice to be stared at," returned Linda, "so perhaps we'd better entertain one another as best we can at the station; it seemed rather a horrid little place, but what better can we do?"
However, this experiment was spared them, for they had not gone more than half way to their destination when they were pleasantly accosted by a man who was coming from the other direction. "I believe you are the ladies who came from Sandbridge on the train this morning," he began. "I am Mr. Brown, the agent of the railroad, and as such I feel that I must extend you such hospitality as we have to offer. Our accommodations at the station are rather poor, and you have a long wait before you, for I suppose you take the seven o'clock train."
"Yes, we intended to," Miss Ri told him.
"Then I beg that you will make yourselves comfortable at my house. It is only a step away. I am sure you will find it a better place to wait than the station." He was so evidently anxious for the good repute of the village, and was so earnestly sincere in his invitation that there was but one thing to do, and that to accept.
Mr. Brown conducted them up on the porch of a neat little house, opened the door and ushered them into an orderly sitting-room where he saw that they were provided with the most comfortable of the chairs and then he settled himself to entertain them. But a very few remarks had been exchanged before he sprang to his feet with a shocked expression on his face. "Ladies," he exclaimed, "I am entirely forgetting that you will not be able to get any supper before you reach home, and that it will be then very late. What was I thinking of? We have only just finished our own meal, and—Excuse me, but I must speak to Mrs. Brown," and before they could utter a word of protest he rushed from the room.
"Do you suppose he has gone to fetch the keys of the city?" whispered Linda. "What are we to do, Aunt Ri? We can't run, for there is nowhere that we can escape, and—"