"'Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,'" said the Doctor, gravely. "And if bad news should ever come to you, my dear Adaly,—though I have none to tell you now,—may you have strength to bear it like a Christian!"
"I will! I can!" said she, with a great glow upon her face.
Never more than in that moment had the heart of the old gentleman warmed toward Adèle. Not by any possibility could he make himself the willing instrument of punishing the sin of the father through this trustful and confiding girl. Nay, he felt, as he looked upon her, that he could gladly make of himself a shelter for her against such contempt or neglect as the world might have in store.
When Reuben came presently to summon Adèle to their evening engagement at the Elderkins', the Doctor followed their retreating figures, as they strolled out of the parsonage-gate, with a new and strange interest. Most inscrutable and perplexing was the fact, that this outcast child, whom scarce one in his parish would have been willing to admit to the familiarities of home,—this daughter of infidel France, about whose mind the traditions of the Babylonish harlot had so long lingered,—who had never known motherly counsel or a father's reproof,—that she, with the stain of heathenism upon her skirts, should have grown into the possession of such a holy, placid, and joyous trust. And there was his poor son beside her, the child of so many hopes, reared, as it were, under the very droppings of the altar, still wandering befogged in the mazes of error, if, indeed, he were not in his secret heart a scoffer. Now that such a result was wholly impracticable and impossible, it did occur to him that perhaps no helpmeet for Reuben could so surely guide him in the way of truth. But of any perplexity of judgment on this score he was now wholly relieved. If his own worldly pride had not stood in the way, (and he was dimly conscious of a weakness of this kind,) the wish of Maverick was authoritative and final. The good man had not the slightest conception of how matters might really stand between the two young parties; he had discovered the anxieties of Miss Eliza in regard to them, and had often queried with himself if too large a taint of worldliness were not coloring the manœuvres of his good sister. For himself he chose rather to leave the formation of all such ties in the hands of Providence, and entertained singularly old-fashioned notions in regard to the sacredness of the marriage-bond and the mystery of its establishment.
In view, however, of possible eventualities, it was necessary that he should come to a full understanding with the spinster in regard to the state of affairs between Adèle and Reuben, and that he should make disclosure to her of the confessions of Maverick. For the second time in his life the Doctor dreaded the necessity of taking his sister into full confidence. The first was on that remarkable occasion—so long past by—when he had declared his youthful love for Rachel, and feared the opposition which would grow out of the spinster's family pride. Now, as then, he apprehended some violent outbreak. He knew all her positiveness and inflexibility,—an inflexibility with which, fortunately, his convictions of duty rarely, if ever, came in conflict. He therefore respected it very greatly. In all worldly affairs, especially in all that regarded social proprieties, he was accustomed to look upon the opinions of his sister as eminently sound, and to give them full indorsement. Unwittingly the old gentleman had subordinated the whole arrangement of his ceremonious visitings and of his wardrobe to the active and lively suggestions of Miss Eliza. Over and over, when in an absent moment he had slipped from his study for a stroll down the street, the keen eye of the maiden sister had detected him before yet he had passed through the parsonage-gate, and her keen voice came after him,—
"Really, Benjamin, that coat is hardly respectable at this hour on the street. You'll find your new one hanging in the press."
And the Doctor, casting a wary look over his person, as if to protest in favor of an old friend, would go back submissively to comply with the exactions of the precise spinster. A wife could not have been more irritatingly observant of such shortcomings; and it is doubtful if even so godly a man would have yielded to a wife's suggestions with fewer protests.
After due reflection on the letter of Maverick, the Doctor stepped softly to the stairs, and said,—
"Eliza, may I speak with you for a few moments in the study?"
There was something in the parson's tone that promised an important communication; and Miss Johns presently appeared and seated herself, work in hand, over against the parson, at the study-table. Older than when we took occasion to describe her appearance in the earlier portion of this narrative, and—if it could be—more prim and stately. A pair of delicately bowed gold spectacles were now called into requisition by her, for the nicer needle-work on which she specially prided herself. Yet her eye had lost none of its apparent keenness, and, inclining her head slightly, she threw an inquiring glance over her spectacles at the Doctor, who was now as composed as if the startling news of the day had been wholly unheard.