‘I am sure you will find it so. Are you going home soon?’
‘Yes—as soon as I’ve had my breakfast. It’s a good walk from here to Aldwick.’
‘So it is.—We are going that way too?’ she added thinkingly.
‘Mr. Elder is a great friend of papa’s—isn’t he, mamma?’ said the girl.
‘Yes, my dear. They were friends at college.’
‘I have heard Mr Elder speak of Mr Osborne,’ I said. ‘Do you live near us?’
‘Not very far off—in the next parish, where my husband is rector,’ she answered. ‘If you could wait till the afternoon, we should be happy to take you there. The pony-carriage is coming for us.’
‘Thank you, ma’am,’ I answered; ‘but I ought to go immediately after breakfast. You won’t mention about the roof, will you? I oughtn’t to get Clara into trouble.’
‘She is a wild girl,’ said Mrs Osborne; ‘but I think you are quite right.’
‘How lucky it was I knew the library!’ said Mary, who had become quite friendly, from under her mother’s wing.