A pang struck to the honest hearts of Timothy Harding and his wife. Ida must leave them. After all the happy years which they had watched over and cared for her, she must leave them at length.
While they were silent in view of their threatened loss, an elegantly dressed lady appeared on the threshold. Smiling, radiant with happiness, Mrs. Clifton seemed, to the cooper's family, almost a being from another sphere.
"Mother," said Ida, taking the hand of the stranger, and leading her up to Mrs. Harding, "this is my other mother, who has always taken such good care of me, and loved me so well."
"Mrs. Harding," said Mrs, Clifton, her voice full of feeling, "how can I ever thank you for your kindness to my child?"
"My child!"
It was hard for Mrs. Harding to hear another speak of Ida this way.
"I have tried to do my duty by her," she said, simply. "I love her as if she were my own."
"Yes," said the cooper, clearing his throat, and speaking a little huskily, "we love her so much that we almost forgot that she wasn't ours. We have had her since she was a baby, and it won't be easy at first to give her up."
"My good friends," said Mrs. Clifton, earnestly, "I acknowledge your claim. I shall not think of asking you to make that sacrifice. I shall always think of Ida as only a little less yours than mine."
The cooper shook his head.