"I should have liked much to meet Miss Hinsdale," said Miss Margaretta, in a tone of regret. "But you know best."
"Oh, no, no," said Anne, letting her arms fall in sudden despondency. "I sometimes think that I know nothing, and worse than nothing! Moments come when I would give years of my life for one hour, only one, of trusting reliance upon some one wiser, stronger, than I—who would tell me what I ought to do."
But this cry of the young heart (brave, but yet so young) distressed Miss Margaretta. If the pilot should lose courage, what would become of the passengers? She felt herself looking into chaos.
Anne saw this. And controlled herself again.
"When should you start?" said the elder lady, relieved, and bringing forward a date. Miss Margaretta always found great support in dates.
"I can not tell yet. We must first hear from Miss Lois."
"I will write to her myself," said Miss Margaretta, putting on her spectacles and setting to work at once. It was a relief to be engaged upon something tangible.
And write she did. The pages she sent to Miss Lois, and the pages with which Miss Lois replied were many, eloquent, and underlined. Before the correspondence was ended they had scientifically discovered, convicted, and hanged the murderer, and religiously buried him.
Miss Lois was the most devoted partisan the accused man had gained. She was pleader, audience, public opinion, detective, judge, and final clergyman, in one. She had never seen Heathcote. That made no difference. She was sure he was a concentration of virtue, and the victim not of circumstances (that was far too mild), but of a "plot" (she wanted to say "popish," but was restrained by her regard for Père Michaux).
Miss Teller saw Heathcote daily. So far, she had not felt it necessary that Anne should accompany her. But shortly before the time fixed for the young girl's departure she was seized with the idea that it was Anne's duty to see him once. For perhaps he could tell her something which would be of use at Timloesville.