Before ten o'clock the rest of the family crept away to bed. Mr. Wesley sat on in his study. This was the night of the week on which he composed his Sunday morning's sermon. He wrote at it steadily until midnight.
Next morning, about an hour after breakfast, Mrs. Wesley heard the hand-bell rung in the study—the sound for which (it seemed to her) she had been listening in affright for two long days. She went at once. In the passage she met Johnny Whitelamb coming out.
"I am to fetch Miss Hetty," he whispered with a world of dreadful meaning.
But for once Johnny was not strictly obedient. Instead of seeking Hetty he went first across the farmyard and through a small gate whence a path took him to a duck-pond at an angle of the kitchen garden, and just outside its hedge. A pace or two from the brink stood a grindstone in a wooden frame; and here, on the grindstone handle, sat Molly watching the ducks.
"He has sent for her," announced Johnny, and glanced towards the kitchen-garden. "Is she there?"
Molly rose with a set face. She did not answer his question.
"You must give me ten minutes," she said. "Ten minutes; on no account must you bring her sooner."
She limped off towards the house.
So it happened that as Mr. and Mrs. Wesley stood and faced each other across the writing-table they heard a gentle knock, and, turning with a start, saw the door open and Molly walk boldly into the room.
"We are busy," said the Rector sharply, recovering himself. "I did not send for you."