"Papa," said one of the children, "do you think Mr. Linden's had it fine too?"
"What tangents children's minds go off in!" observed Mrs. Stoutenburgh. "Faith! don't eat your raspberries without sugar,—how impatient you are. You used to preach patience to me when I was sick."
"I can be very patient, with these raspberries and no sugar," said Faith, wishing she could hide the bloom of her cheeks as easily as she hid that of the berries under the fine white shower.
"Poor child!" said her friend gently,—"I think you have need of all your patience." And her hands came softly about Faith's plate, removing encumbrances and adding dainties, with a sort of mute sympathy that at the moment could find no more etherial channel. "Mr. Stoutenburgh drove down to Quapaw the other day," she went on in a low voice, "to ask those fishing people what indications our land weather gave of the weather at sea; and—he couldn't half tell me about his visit when he came home," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh, breaking short off in her account. "Linda, go get that glass of white roses and set it by Miss Faith,—maybe she'll take them home with her."
Faith looked at the white roses and smelled their sweetness; and then she said, "Who did you see, Mr. Stoutenburgh?—down at Quapaw?"
"None of the men, my dear—they were all away, but I saw half the rest of the village; and even the children knew what report the men had brought in, and what they thought of the weather. Everybody had a good word to say about it, Miss Faith; and everybody—I do believe!" said the Squire reverently, "had been on their knees to pray for it. Jonathan Ling's wife said that was all they could ever do for him." Which pronoun, be it understood, did not refer to Jonathan Ling.
"They're Mr. Linden's roses, Miss Faith," said little Linda, who stood waiting for more marked admiration,—"do you like them? He always did."
Faith kissed the child, partly to thank her and to stop her lips, partly to hide her own which she felt were tale-telling.
"Where did you get the roses, Linda?"
"O off the bush in the garden. But Mr. Linden always picked one whenever he came, and sometimes he'd stop on his way to school, and just open the gate and get one of these white roses and then go away again. So we called it Mr. Linden's bush." Faith endeavoured to attend to her raspberries after this. When tea was over she was carried off into the drawing-room and the children were kept out.