"I have so much to tell you," she began: "but your mother has forbidden us to talk long. Mr. Barton inquired after you, and when I told him you were quite ill, was very uneasy."
"Why didn't he come in, then, to see me?" asked Ada, turning aside her face.
"He was detained by some persons in the vestry. Only think how mortifying to me to have to wait there for him, as if I expected of course he would come home with me but there was no alternative, as I dared not come alone."
This was only partly true. Mr. Barton stopped a moment on his way out, and the rest of the time had been passed walking in the moonlight at the young lady's suggestion. She was artful enough to see that, as the clergyman was deeply interested in the duties of his profession, an appeal to him about her own heart would best secure his attention to herself. She commenced, therefore, by telling him that, although she had professed religion (lie the first), she had grown cold and worldly,—that his preaching had roused her to a sense of her danger, and that it was solely to enjoy the privilege of his ministration that she had prolonged her visit from week to week.
Mr. Barton heard her in silence, and then gave her some solemn advice upon the danger of trifling with conscience.
This was not exactly what the young lady had calculated upon; but, disguising her real feelings, she spoke of Ada, and found the gentleman all attention. Vexed at his indifference to herself; and indignant that she had not secured the first place in his esteem, she determined to prevent his forming a particular attachment for Ada.
This was not quite so easy a task as she imagined; for the gentleman was a keen judge of character, and before he had ever seen Alice, formed a high opinion of Ada's merits. Then he often met her friend, Miss Locke: and somehow the conversation always turned on the absent one. The apparently careless remark of the young lady, therefore, that she greatly regretted Ada's want of seriousness (lie the second); but that her mind seemed wholly absorbed in an attachment she had formed, did not weigh as much with him as she expected.
Mr. Barton was too anxious a pastor not to discern the signs of real feeling; and he had too often witnessed the tear of penitence in the eye of Ada to believe the first charge.
The second statement rather startled him, though he gave no outward sign of it, and presently remarked,—
"Miss Morrison has been so tenderly nurtured that her parents will be careful, I suppose, to whom they consign her future happiness."