"Oh, it's you, Hodder," he said cheerfully, laying his hand on the rector's arm. "I was just thinking about you."
"This is Miss Marcy, Mr. Bentley," Hodder said.
Mr. Bentley took her hand and led her to a chair.
"Mr. Hodder knows how fond I am of young women," he said. "I have six of them upstairs,—so I am never lonely."
Mr. Bentley did not appear to notice that her lips quivered.
Hodder turned his eyes from her face. "Miss Marcy has been lonely," he explained, "and I thought we might get her a room near by, where she might see them often. She is going to do embroidery."
"Why, Sally will know of a room," Mr. Bentley replied. "Sam!" he called.
"Yessah—yes, Mistah Ho'ace." Sam appeared at the door.
"Ask Miss Sally to come down, if she's not busy."
Kate Marcy sat dumbly in her chair, her hands convulsively clasping its arms, her breast heaving stormily, her face becoming intense with the effort of repressing the wild emotion within her: emotion that threatened to strangle her if resisted, or to sweep her out like a tide and drown her in deep waters: emotion that had no one mewing, and yet summed up a life, mysteriously and overwhelmingly aroused by the sight of a room, and of a kindly old gentleman who lived in it!