"How DARED he take you with those young horses!"
"He thought he could do just what he pleased with them—" said Faith, shaking her head a little.
"And with you—" was in Mr. Linden's mind, but it came not forth.
"Where is your mother?—does she know?"
"Mother's coming," said Faith raising herself from the cushions,—"as soon as she sends up the breakfast. She doesn't know yet. I told Sam not to tell you, Mr. Linden.
"How do you do to-day?"
She answered him with a bright fair glance and in a tone as sweet as happiness could make it,
"Very well!"
Mr. Linden's eyes went from her to the opening door and the entering dishes.
"Sara was not in fault, Miss Faith,—I heard you come home."
In the train of the dishes came Mrs. Derrick, and looked with a little amaze at Mr. Linden off the couch and Faith upon it. But if the first didn't hurt him, she knew the second wouldn't hurt Faith, with whose appearance her mother was not yet quite satisfied. And when they were all at the table, Mrs. Derrick might wonder at those words of very earnest thanksgiving that they were all brought together again, but they needed no explanation to any one else. In all her life Faith had never known just such a breakfast. That sweet sense of being safe—of being shielded,—of breathing an atmosphere where no evil, mental, moral, or physical, could reach her,—how precious it was!—after those hours of fear and sorrow. If her two companions had visibly joined hands around her, she could not have felt the real fact more strongly. And another hand was nearer and more precious still to her apprehension; even the one that made theirs strong and had brought her within them. Faith's face was a fair picture, for all this was there. But Faith's words were few.