Mrs. Carnegie from the dining-room window witnessed the colloquy between the rector and her husband, and came out into the porch to receive her dear Bessie. "They will not expect you at Fairfield until they see you; so come in, love," said she, and Bessie gladly obeyed.
The doctor's house was all the quieter for the absence of the elder boys at Hampton. The other children were playing in the orchard after school. "It is a great convenience to have a school opened here where boys and girls are both taught from four up to ten, and very nicely taught," said the mother. "It gives me a little leisure. Even Totty goes, and likes it, bless her!"
Mr. Carnegie was not many minutes in-doors. He ate a crust standing, and then went away again to answer a summons that had come since he went out in the morning.
"It will be a good opportunity, Bessie, to call on Miss Buff and Miss Wort, and to say a word in passing to the Semples and Mittens; they are always polite in asking after you," Mrs. Carnegie mentioned at the children's dinner. But Miss Buff, having heard that Miss Fairfax was at the doctor's house, forestalled these good intentions by arriving there herself. She was ushered into the drawing-room, and Bessie joined her, and was embraced and rejoiced over exuberantly.
"You dear little thing! I do like you in your habit," cried she. "Turn round—it fits beautifully. So you have been having a ride with the doctor, and seeing everybody, I suppose? Mrs. Wiley wonders when you will call."
"Oh yes, Bessie dear, you must not neglect Mrs. Wiley," said Mrs. Carnegie.
"It will do some day with Lady Latimer—she has constant business at the rectory," Bessie said. She did not wish to waste this precious afternoon in duty-visits to people she did not care for.
"Well, I was to have written to you, and I never did," recommenced Miss Buff.
"Out of sight, out of mind: don't apologize!"
But Miss Buff would explain and extenuate her broken promise: "The fact is, my hands are almost too full: what with the school and the committee, the organ and church, the missionary club and my district, I am a regular lay-curate. Then there is Mr. Duffer's early service, eight o'clock; and Fridays and Wednesdays and all the saints' days, and decorating for the great festivals—perhaps a little too much of that, but on Whitsunday the chancel was lovely, was it not, Mrs. Carnegie?" Mrs. Carnegie nodded her acquiescence. "Then I have a green-house at last, and that gives me something to do. I should like to show you my green-house, Bessie. But you must be used to such magnificent things now that perhaps you will not care for my small place."