‘Mary,’ said Mrs. Scudder, laying her hand on her daughter’s arm, ‘the Doctor loves you!’
‘I know he does, mother,’ said Mary, innocently; ‘and I love him,—dearly!—he is a noble, grand man!’
Mrs. Scudder looked keenly at her daughter. Mary’s eye was as calm as a June sky, and she began, composedly, gathering up the teacups.
‘She did not understand me,’ thought the mother.
CHAPTER X.
THE TEST OF THEOLOGY.
The Doctor went immediately to his study and put on his best coat and his wig, and, surmounting them by his cocked hat, walked manfully out of the house, with his gold-headed cane in his hand.
‘There he goes!’ said Mrs. Scudder, looking regretfully after him. ‘He is such a good man!—but he has not the least idea how to get along in the world. He never thinks of anything but what is true; he hasn’t a particle of management about him.’
‘Seems to me,’ said Mary, ‘that is like an Apostle. You know, mother, St. Paul says, “In simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world.”’