But I heard Father's
reply--"Tell her yourself, sir."
On which the Old Squire stuffed the big paper into my arms, and put
his hand on my head and patted it.
"I told you I was a bad hand at talking, my dear," he said, "but
Mary's Meadow is given away, and that's the Deed of Gift which you've
got in your arms, drawn up as tight as any rascal of a lawyer can do
it, and that's not so tight, I believe, but what some other rascal of
a lawyer could undo it. However, they may let you alone. For I've
given it to you, my dear, and it is yours. So you can plant, and play,
and do what you please there. 'You, and your heirs and assigns, for
ever,' as the rascals say."
It was my turn now to be speechless. But as I stared blankly in front
of me, I saw that Father had come round, and was looking at me through
his eye-glass. He nodded to me, and said, "Yes, Mary, the Squire has
given Mary's Meadow to you, and it is yours."
* * * * *
Nothing would induce the Old Squire to take it back, so I had to have
it, for my very own. He said he had always been sorry he had spoken so
roughly to me, but he could not say so, as he and Father were not on
speaking terms. Just lately he was dining with Lady Catherine, to meet
her cousins from the barracks, and she was telling people after dinner
about our game (rather mean of her, I think, to let out our secrets at
a dinner-party), and when he heard about my planting things in the
hedges, he remembered what I had said.
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