Their way lay over snow-covered ground, through bare woods, up and down rolling hills, and over frozen streams.
It was three o'clock in the afternoon when they emerged from the last piece of woods and entered upon a cultivated clearing, in which stood an old-fashioned farmhouse, with a steep roof with gable ends, dormer windows, and wide porches, surrounded by its barn, granaries and negro quarters.
As Miss Grandiere pulled up at the horse block before the door, a lady, tall, stately, handsome, with a fair complexion, blue eyes and brown hair, very like Miss Grandiere herself, and handsomely dressed in a puce-colored silk pelisse, and a beaver bonnet, appeared at the door, and said:
"You haven't time to stop, Sukey. Sally and the children are all well, and are in the storeroom picking over apples. You can see them when we come home this evening; but now we must hurry; so you just get down and set the child in your seat, and let Dan lead the horse, and we will walk through the woods to Miss Sibby's. I don't know what is going on there, but something is."
"I thought it was hot biscuits out of the new flour," said Miss Grandiere.
"Yes, it is that, too," replied Mrs. Hedge, without perceiving the sarcasm; "but there is something else--something that that wild young blade, Roland Bayard, and that young Midshipman Force, have on foot. I know there is!"
"So Gad says. I couldn't get much out of that nigger, though. He said he was in a hurry, and hadn't time to stop. He said he had to carry that bag of wheat to the mill and get it ground, and carry it back home in time to make bread for supper; so you see I couldn't get much out of him."
By this time the new order of procession was formed, and the sisters walked on together, followed by little Rosemary on the saddle, and Dan leading the horse.
"I should not think," said Miss Grandiere, "that young Midshipman Force would feel very much like skylarking after such a disappointment and mortification as he has had."
"No would you, now? But then he was a mere boy, and she only a child, when they were engaged; and then after three years, you know, both might have changed their minds," suggested practical Mrs. Hedge.
"I don't know," sighed sentimental Miss Grandiere.
