“And all you’d done for me and my folks,” murmured Pollie.
“You should act so suddenly in such an important matter, with no reference to me or my trying position,” Mrs. Challoner went on. “Perhaps, in my turn, I was not considerate enough of your standpoint. Anyhow, Pollie, as you say, now we know we are friends again.”
That was a pleasant interlude. Better even than its immediate comfort and security was the mystic hint that it seemed to convey not only of a far-off greater “restitution of all things,” but also of a present protecting power—that Fatherly love which takes us up when, in the ways of life or of death, parents and spouses and friends forsake or fail us. “Goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our life.” We have to walk forward in that faith, and only by such walking forward can faith be transformed into sacred, secret knowledge.
It was well, indeed, that there was something pleasant. For, alas for human nature, it is by foreseeing evil as to its doings that one can most easily establish reputation as a far-seeing prophet!
Some days passed before the arrival of Clementina’s box and the receipt of the postal order were acknowledged from Hull. Then a little parcel came.
“I should not wonder but the poor soul, if she has come a little to her senses, has sent some bit of her needlework as a peace-offering,” observed Mrs. Challoner as she unfastened the string.
Far from it! The parcel contained only the half-used packet of mourning envelopes and a letter. It was a comfort to see that the epistle was by another and an apparently saner hand.
The letter was not very long. It began—
“Mrs. Challoner,—The trunk has come to hand. We had to pay a man sixpence extra for bringing it up. Your letter and post-office order have come. We see you pay only for the current month. Considering our niece was wore out at your place and had to leave through illness caused there, we think you might have done a little more. Our niece says these envelopes don’t belong to her, and she doesn’t want to take away anything that isn’t hers. She says she never knew such goings on as there were at your place, and if the pore dear had gone out of her mind it wouldn’t have been no wonder. Maybe it is someone else as is out of their mind. Our niece has got a little means of her own, and needn’t go to service except where she is valued. She won’t go anywhere till she’s got back the strength she lost in your place, and she won’t come back to you on no account.
“Yours,
“Sarah Ann Micklewrath.”