"Only to-day, your Reverence. This is Mrs. Amabel Leighton, and her kinswoman, Mrs. Lucy Corbet, who have come home, and are staying with me, till they can go to their aunts at Highbeck house."
"That is not likely to be very soon, I fear, unless both of these young ladies have had smallpox!" said Mr. Cheriton. "I have just come home from my father's, and went over to pay my respects to the old ladies, who made me the bearer of dispatches to yourself."
Mr. Cheriton bowed to us severally as he spoke, and then produced a letter bound with a bit of floss silk, which he gave to Mrs. Thorpe. Then bowing again, and whistling to his dog, he departed. Mrs. Thorpe led us into her own parlor behind the shop, where we waited in some anxiety, while she read the note the gentleman had handed her.
"Here is a change of affairs with a witness!" said she, when she had succeeded in making out its contents. "My dear young ladies, can you content yourselves to live with me for a few weeks? Your aunt writes that they have two cases of smallpox in the house, and that they are every day expecting Mrs. Chloe, the youngest lady, to come down with the same, and that she would prefer to have you remain with me till the danger is over. I think you told me you had never had the smallpox."
"Not unless we were very young at the time," we told her.
"Ah, then we will run no risks. But can you content yourselves with living quietly in my plain way for a little, or would you rather go to my sister's school, where you can have companions of your own age?"
We assured her that we would rather stay with her than go anywhere else, and, indeed, I think we both felt it to be a reprieve. We had grown to love Mrs. Thorpe, and to feel confidence in her, and the notion of strange companions of our own age was rather alarming than attractive. So the matter was settled. We would make it our home for the present, with good Mrs. Thorpe, who would on the morrow send word to that effect to our aunts at Highbeck Hall.
"Amabel," said I, when we were once more alone in our own pretty room, "do you think we did wrong to be present at Protestant worship? Ought we to have come away?"
"No, I don't think so," answered Amabel, after a little consideration. "We could not help it, and there was nothing contrary to religion in the prayers."
"But there was no Hail Mary! Or any other devotion to the mother of God."