He did not come regularly--the wisdom of that was tacitly understood between them; since there was to be no marriage, there could necessarily be no courtship.

There was never any sitting up together in the north parlor, after the fashion of village lovers.

Jerome merely spent an hour or two in the sitting-room with the Squire and his wife and Lucina.

Sometimes he and the Squire talked politics and town affairs while Lucina and her mother sewed.

Sometimes the four played whist, or bezique, for in those days Jerome was learning to take a hand at cards, but he had always Mrs.Merritt for his partner, and the Squire Lucina.