"It—it isn't mine!" she managed to say in a faint voice and with a catch in her throat.
"I had not supposed so," Parson Endicott answered gravely. "I came to tell you, Miss Marvin, that Mr. Samuel Rosewarne and I have agreed to recognise your claim. By so doing we shall be piously observing his father's wishes, and—er—I anticipate no opposition from my fellow-members on the Board. The school—you have already paid it a visit, perhaps? No? It will, I venture to think, exceed your expectations. The school is furnished and ready. I suggest—if the other Managers consent—that we open it formally on Tuesday next, with a short religious service, consecrating, so to speak, your future labours. Yours is a wonderful sphere of usefulness, Miss Marvin; and may I say what pleasure it gives me to learn that you are a Churchwoman. A regular communicant, I hope?"
Hester was silent. She disliked this man, and saw no reason to be hurried into making any confession to him.
"It is a point upon which I am accustomed to lay great stress. In these days, with schismatics on all hands to contend against, it behoves all members of the true Church to show a bold and united front." He leaned his head on one side and looked at her interrogatively. "Do you play the harmonium?" he asked.
But at this point Mr. Sam thrust his head out through the counting-house doorway, and the parson coughed discreetly, as much as to say that the answer might wait.
"Well, Miss Marvin," said Mr. Sam jocosely, "we've fixed it up for you between us!"
Hester thanked them both briefly, and wished them good-day.
"She dresses respectably," said the parson, when the two were left alone. "I detect a certain earnestness in her, though I cannot say as yet how far it is based on genuine religious principles."
"She is more comely than I expected," said Mr. Sam.
At the ferry Hester found Nuncey awaiting her with a boat-load of the Benny children.