Miss Ashton smiled as she read the note. Repentance by the wholesale she had never found very reliable; and in this instance she would have had much more confidence if the girls had come to her, and made a full confession, without waiting to be found out.
It was not until after two sleepless nights that she came to the conclusion to give them further trial; and when she called them to her room, one by one, and had a long and faithful talk with them, sending them from her tenderly penitent, she felt sure her course had been a right one. 135
Then she made a short speech to the school, went over briefly what had happened, not in the least sparing the impropriety of the stolen ride, but, on account of the repentance and promises from the girls concerned, she had decided not to expel them now, but to give them a chance to redeem the character they had lost. The school clapped her enthusiastically as she closed.
CHAPTER XXI.
ACCEPTING A THANKSGIVING INVITATION.
A week before Thanksgiving, Marion Parke received this note from her Aunt Betty:—
Dear Niece,—If you haven’t anywhere else to go, and have money to come with, you can take the cars from Boston up here and spend Thanksgiving Day with us at Belden. Your pa used to think a lot of coming here when he went to college—the great pity he ever went. He might have been well-to-do if he had stuck to farming, but he always hankered after an eddication, and he got it, and nothin’ else. Your Cousin Abijah will drive over in his cutter and bring you here. Don’t have nothing to do with Isaac Bumps; he’ll charge you twenty-five cents, and tell you it’s a mile and a half from the station to my house, but it’s only a mile, and don’t you hear to him, for your Cousin Abijah can’t come until after the milking, and if the cows are fractious, it may make him belated.
I am your great-aunt,
Betsy Parke.