Bessie lingered a little, with her eyes fixed far away, and her head on one side as if she were hearkening to something.
"What is it, darling?" asked her father. "Are you not ready to go?"
"Yes, papa," she answered, putting her hand into his; "I was only listening to the still."
Her father smiled, and led her on till they had joined the rest. They were quite near home when the Colonel, who had fallen a little behind with his wife, called to Maggie and Bessie.
"To-morrow is Sunday," he said. "Have you found a place where you can have your Sunday-school class?"
No, Maggie and Bessie said, they had not thought of it.
"But perhaps Mr. Porter will let us have it in one of his barns, as Mr. Jones used to do last summer," said Bessie.
"I have found a better place than that for you," said Colonel Rush; "that is, on a pleasant Sunday. When it rains, we must find cover within doors. See, here, what do you think of this for a Sunday-school room?" And he guided them a little to one side, where a sloping path and four or five natural steps led down into a broad crevice or cleft among the rocks which surrounded the lake.
A lovely room it was indeed, carpeted with moss, curtained and shaded by the green trees which waved overhead, and furnished with seats made by one or two fallen stones on one side, on the other by a ledge of rock which jutted out at just such a height as to make a convenient bench for little people. The steps by which they had descended, closed them in behind; in front lay the lake; beyond that again the gray old rocks, the mountain rising bold and stern above the peaceful waters. No glimpse of the Lake House or its cheerful surroundings could be seen, unless one peered around the edge of the inclosing mass of rock, and this the Colonel would not permit the children to do, lest they should fall into the water which washed at the very foot of the pretty retreat.