He had to listen to a good deal of wonderment about the length of his absence, and was fain to confess to an accidental encounter with Captain Sedgewick, which had necessitated his going into the cottage.
"Why, what could have taken you that way, Gilbert?"
"A truant fancy, I suppose, my dear. It is as good a way as any other."
Mrs. Lister sighed, and shook her head doubtfully. "What fools you men are," she said, "about a pretty face!" "Including Martin, Belle, when he fell in love with your fair self?"
"Martin did not stare me out of countenance in church, sir. But you have almost kept us waiting for prayers."
The servants came filing in. Martin Lister woke with a start, and Gilbert Fenton knelt down among his sister's household to make his evening orisons. But his thoughts were not easily to be fixed that night. They wandered very wide of that simple family prayer, and made themselves into a vision of the future, in which he saw his life changed and brightened by the companionship of a fair young wife.