Her father and the miller turned around, together, but they could hardly believe their eyes, and when Jenny came to tell her story, it was still more difficult to believe their ears. When, at length, however, they understood the story, her father said,—
“Well, Jenny, that’s pretty well—pretty well. If you had not got the bag with you for proof, I should think that you had got asleep in the sleigh, and been dreaming.”
Here Mary Jay paused, and shut the book.
“Is that the end?” asked the children.
“Yes, that is the end,” replied Mary Jay.
“Well, I think,” said Laura, “that Jenny was a pretty courageous girl.”
“And I think,” said Royal, “that she was a pretty wise girl.”
“But I don’t think she did quite right,” said Marielle, “to drive back again without her mother’s leave.”
“I am not sure of that myself,” said Mary Jay. “But now, girls, it is time for you to go home. Come, all of you, and shake hands with me, and bid me good-by, and leave me here. I am going away, to be gone a long time, and I don’t know when I shall see you again. But there is one thing that I want you to do for me. Be very gentle and obedient, at home, now, for three days; and they will think it is owing to your having paid a visit to Mary Jay.”