When I was twenty-five, Hugh Blair came to Newbridge, having
bought a farm near the village. He was a stranger, from Lower
Carmody, and so was not imbued with any preconceptions of
Meredith superiority. In his eyes I was just a girl like
others--a girl to be wooed and won by any man of clean life and
honest heart. I met him at a little Sunday-School picnic over at
Avonlea, which I attended because of my class. I thought him
very handsome and manly. He talked to me a great deal, and at
last he drove me home. The next Sunday evening he walked up from
church with me.

Hester was away, or, of course, this would never have happened.
She had gone for a month's visit to distant friends.

In that month I lived a lifetime. Hugh Blair courted me as the
other girls in Newbridge were courted. He took me out driving
and came to see me in the evenings, which we spent for the most
part in the garden. I did not like the stately gloom and
formality of our old Meredith parlor, and Hugh never seemed to
feel at ease there. His broad shoulders and hearty laughter were
oddly out of place among our faded, old-maidish furnishings.

Mary Sloane was very much pleased at Hugh's visit. She had
always resented the fact that I had never had a "beau," seeming
to think it reflected some slight or disparagement upon me. She
did all she could to encourage him.

But when Hester returned and found out about Hugh she was very
angry--and grieved, which hurt me far more. She told me that I