Peggy of the Bartons Author:Bithia Mary Croker Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. CHASING THE BLACK C( LT. Captain Kinlooh was rather surprised to find him- Belf retracing his steps to Nether Barton, accompanied by a st... more »range girl, who interested him in a surprising degree! She was not garrulous, neither did she giggle,—as he had half expected; on the contrary, she appeared to be endowed with a remarkable gift of silence, and walked along beside him, carelessly swinging her little basket (which she had declined to relinquish), seemingly but half conscious of his presence. " What a pretty old place it is! " he remarked, when at last they reached the top of the hill, and paused for a moment, looking down upon the village. There, below them, in the hollow, a faint May breeze stirred great masses of lime, elm, and walnut trees, through which peeped the church spire, and various red and black roofs. All around lay low wooded downs, and green pastures; the tinkling of a sheep bell, and the corncrake's discordant note, were the only sounds that broke a kind of Sabbath silence. Ages of accumulated quiet appeared to rest upon this sequestered spot. " Y6s, it is pretty; all the Bartons are pretty," rejoined Miss Summerhayes, precisely as if she were speaking of a family of girls. " But a little sleepy ?" he suggested. " It does not seem sleepy to me, and," with a sudden light-hearted laugh, " you may not have heard that the Barton folk have the reputation of being very wideawake ?" " No ; the reputation, I presume, is local ?" " Oh, we are not so dull as you may f ancy. We have the Foresters' flower show and fete on Monday next, and on Friday a dance at the old manor." " Are you going to these festivities ?" " To the fete, certainly. I am not so sure about the dance," and she gave a little involuntary sigh. " And no do...« less