“Yes; it is all Richard’s doing. So much more good, and wise, and humble, as he is. No wonder his teaching—” and Ethel sat down and cried again.
Mary pondered. “It makes me very glad,” she said; “and yet I don’t know why one cries. Ethel, do you think”—she came near, and whispered—“that Una has met dear mamma there?”
Ethel kissed her. It was almost the first time Mary had spoken of her mother; and she answered, “Dear Mary, we cannot tell—we may think. It is all one communion, you know.”
Mary was silent, and, next time she spoke, it was to hope that Ethel would tell the Cocksmoor children about Una.
Ethel was obliged to dress, and go downstairs to tea. Her father seemed to have been watching for her, with his study door open, for he came to meet her, took her hand, and said, in a low voice, “My dear child, I wish you joy. This will be a pleasant message, to bid poor Ritchie good speed for his ordination, will it not?”
“That it will, papa—”
“Why, Ethel, have you been crying over it all this time?” said he, struck by the sadness of her voice.
“Many other things, papa. I am so unworthy—but it was not our doing—but the grace—”
“No, but thankful you may be, to have been the means of awakening the grace!”
Ethel’s lips trembled. “And oh, papa! coming to-day, when I have been behaving so ill to you, and Miss Bracy, and Flora, and all.