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How Pedy Breck got along so smooth and slick with the work, I don't know, nor never shall. I can make as good light bread as ever was I won't give up to anybody but when I made the last, my mind was all stirred up with a puddin'-stick as 'twere, and I couldn't remember whether I put any yeast into it or not." From this time all went well. Deborah, in her slow way, proved to be a treasure.

"Don't you think, mother," said Emily, "that you can manage to find, me a girl as good as Pedy?" "I think it will be impossible. Pedy is a kind of rara avis in all that appertains to housekeeping. She excels in everything. You will be obliged now to limit your expectations. If you can obtain a girl who knows how to cook well, it is the best you can hope to do.

She did her best, and felt tolerably well satisfied at being able to find a girl who had done the cooking in a large family in the country for more than a year. Pedy Breck left Mrs. Brenton on Saturday after tea, and Deborah Leach took her place on Monday morning.

There was one at work, however, though neither he nor they realized it, who was sapping their happiness at its very foundation. This was an honest, intelligent farmer, by the name of Simon Lundley, who one day, when in the city, happened to overhear the praises bestowed on Pedy Breck by George Brenton, touching her excellence as a cook and clear-starcher.

He had seen Pedy a few months previous, when on a visit to a sister who resided in the neighbourhood of his home, and remembered of having thought it strange that she had never married as well as her sister, as she was remarkably good-looking."

"And you have been housekeeping four whole days." "Eight days, mother!" "It is only four days since everything was arranged, and you commenced talking your meals regularly at home." "I know, but then if we can live happily four days, we can four years." "Yes, if Pedy could always live with you." "She appears to be quite well satisfied with her situation," was Emily's answer.

In consideration of its being washing-day, George had sent home beefsteak for dinner, and Pedy, the same as she always did, had made some pies on Saturday, and placed them in the refrigerator for Sunday and Monday.

"It appears to me, Emily, that you might have seen what the girl was about before she spoiled the whole." "How could I," said Emily, "when she was in the kitchen and I was in the parlour hem-stitching your linen handkerchiefs? Pedy never needed any overseeing."

Pedy recognised him at once, and had a kind of a vague prescience as to the object of his visit, or such might have been the inference drawn from the deep crimson which suddenly suffused her cheeks. From that time he visited her regularly every Sunday, and it was soon decided that they should be married in season to enable her to pack the fall butter.