"Now, my dear Miss Wenna," said the old clergyman, "you must be quite tired out with your labors. Come into the study; I believe the tray has been taken in there."
"Do you know, Mr. Trewhella," said Mabyn boldly, "that Wenna hadn't time to eat a single bit when all those children were gobbling up cake? Couldn't you let her have a little bit—a little bit of cold meat, now?"
"Dear! dear me!" said the kind old gentleman in the deepest distress, "that I should not have remembered!"
There was no use in Wenna protesting. In the snug little study she was made to eat some supper; and if she got off with drinking one glass of sherry, it was not through the intervention of her sister, who apparently would have had her drink a tumblerful.
It was not until a quarter past ten that the girls could get away.
"Now I must see you young ladies down to the village, lest some one should run away with you," the old clergyman said, taking down his top-coat.
"Oh no, you must not—you must not indeed, Mr. Trewhella!" Mabyn said anxiously. "Wenna and I always go about by ourselves; and far later than this, too. It is a beautiful, clear night. Why—"
Her impetuosity made her sister smile. "You talk as if you would rather like to be run away with, Mabyn," she said. "But indeed, Mr. Trewhella, you must not think of coming with us. It is quite true what Mabyn says."
And so they went out into the clear darkness together, and the door was shut, and they found themselves in the silent world of the night-time, with the white stars throbbing overhead. Far away in the distance they could hear the murmur of the sea.
"Are you cold, Mabyn, that you tremble so?" said the elder sister.