"Heavens, Diana!" I exclaimed, "why do that? It was desecration!"
"You'll know if you listen, Peregrine!" As she spoke there came an
answering whistle from the woods before us. "It's Jerry!" she nodded.
"It's Jerry Jarvis--hark, he be coming to meet me!"
"Then he knows it is you?"
"Of course! He learned me to whistle for him so when I was a little
child and--" She turned suddenly, and with a little, glad cry of "O
Jerry!" ran forward into the shadows and was clasped and hugged in a
pair of dim arms.
"Why, Ann--why, Anna, dear child--have ye come a-seeking your old
Jeremy? What is it this time, dear lass; tell your trouble to your old
pal--"
"O Jerry, I'm free, I'm free of 'em at last!"
"Free o' the Folk, lass? Lord, here's j'y! But what of old Azor--that
witch o' darkness?"
"Her too, Jerry."
"How, lass, how so?" Here Diana reached her hand to me and I stepped
into the Tinker's purview.
"He did it for me, Jerry."
"Lord!" exclaimed the Tinker, falling back a step. "Lord love me--a
boy! A lad at last! Well, well, 't is nat'ral, I suppose, though what
I can see of him bean't much to look at, Ann--but no more am I, for
that matter! And he ain't exactly a Goliath of Gath--though no more am
I again. But then I've noticed that great men be generally of a
comfortable, middling size. And if he be your _chal_, my dear--"
"Have you forgotten me so soon, Mr. Jarvis?" said I at this juncture,
whereupon he turned to peer into my face, then caught and wrung my
hand.
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