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Hicky, the Omoana “pub” would not see him—Marsh—very much in the future. That at least was pleasant news to Ann. It was quite apparent that Mrs. Bentley no longer possessed a proprietary interest in the young shepherd, for Rodney’s tone was certainly not that of a disappointed lover.

On the last afternoon before the party from Tirau returned, Ann sat in the little front room talking to the invalid, His knee was out of the splints now, and he had been up for an hour or two that morning.

“You’ll come tomorrow?” he asked.

“If I’m not too busy, I may be. Mrs. Pratt is on the sick-list now. She’s in bed today with a cold and a slight temperature. I see myself getting the breakfast tomorrow.”

“Can you cook?”

“Not very brilliantly. But I can manage toast and bacon and eggs, and a plain dinner. I’m making Mrs. Pratt some jelly and chicken broth—I’ll save some for you, then you’ll be able to judge if I’m a good cook or not.”

“You can do everything.”

She laughed.

“I’ve had to try to do a good many. My father was a doctor in a hard-up suburb. But you told me I should never make a sheep-farmer.”

“That’s a man’s work.”

“Pooh! Lots of girls are working on the land in England.”

They wrangled good-humoredly over this for a time, and then she rose to depart.

“I hate your going,” he said abruptly in a low voice. Ann, standing close beside his bed, was silent.

Suddenly he took her hand, and turning his face