“Yes, papa.”
“You do not care for him, then?”
“No, dear papa.”
“And yet, my child, he is your husband still,” said the minister.
“Unhappily, yes; but he has left me. It is the kindest act of his life toward me.”
“And you never wish to see him again, Jennie?”
“Never, nor to hear of him. I am happy now in a quiet way. I wish for nothing better on earth than to live in a quiet way at the darling little parsonage with you and dearest mamma and my blessed baby.”
Suddenly into the pathos and gravity of Jennie’s face came a ripple of humor as she spoke of her child and looked at her father.
The Rev. James Campbell was certainly the youngest grandfather in England, if not in Europe. He was really but thirty-eight years old, and might have been taken for a mere boy, for he was of medium height and of slight and elegant form, with a shapely head, pure, clean-cut classic features, a clear, fair complexion and dark chestnut hair, parted in the middle, cut rather short and slightly curling. He wore neither beard nor mustache. His dress was a clerical suit of black cloth of the cheapest quality and somewhat threadbare; but it perfectly fitted his faultless figure; but his linen collar and cuffs were spotless even after a railway journey in the second-class cars and his gloves were neatly mended.
Altogether he looked very young and even boyish, as we said, though he was in middle life and a grandfather.