“Both, Virginia,” answered the truthful rector meekly.
“Don’t you dare to call me Virginia,” she commanded. “You know I hate it! If you came of your own accord you are an interfering person, and if you came because he told you to, you’re a—you’re a—”
“The boy loves you very much, Virginia, and I think he’d make you a good husband.”
“Do you want me to marry him? Are you tired of looking at me?”
“I think he would make you a good husband.”
“Do you want to see me married?”
The rector got up, and started for the door, but she stood in front of him. “Was that why you planted the rosebush in the hedge?” she asked. He bowed before her, and she watched him grow pale. Then she laughed, a little low, tender laugh, and—kissed him. The rector was dimly aware of her swift rush from the room, and of his own going home blindly.
The next day he left his house early, to walk over the hills to the home of a distant poor parishioner; coming home late in the afternoon he came upon her, seated on the ledge of rock upon the hillcrest. She walked calmly to meet him, and standing bravely before him she asked him the question. It was then that the rector discovered that the Angel with which he had been struggling was not, as he had believed, the Angel of Temptation, but, indeed, the Angel of Life. As they walked down later, in the red glow, hand in hand, he asked:
“Do you remember, Ladybird, the cards on the silver butter-dish?”
She laughed and said: “And those first ginger cookies?”