rd marking the verse at which she had paused, and
that verse was: "He came unto his own, and his own received him
not." And she realized that her thoughts during the silence had been:
"Suppose Miss Hastings should call and should inquire for her, and she
should go with Aunt Helen to return the call, should she wear mother's
black lace shawl with her blue silk dress, or simply the little
ruffled cape which matched the dress! She read that last verse over
again, with an uncomfortable consciousness that she was not getting on
very well; but try as she would, Ester's thoughts seemed resolved not
to stay with that first chapter of John--they roved all over New York,
visited all the places that she had seen, and a great many that she
wanted to see, and that seemed beyond her grasp, going on meantime
with the verses, and keeping up a disagreeable undercurrent of
disgust. Over those same restless thoughts there came a tap at the
door, and Maggie's voice outside.

"Miss Ried, Miss Abbie sent me to say that there was company waiting
to see you, and if you please would you come down as soon as you
could?"

Ester sprang up. "Very well," she responded to Maggie. "I'll be down
immediately."

Then she waited to shut the card into her Bible to keep the place,
took a parting peep in the mirror to see that the brown hair and blue
ribbon were in order, wondered if it were really the Hastings who
called on her, unlocked her door, and made a rapid passage down the
stairs--most unpleasantly conscious, however, at that very moment that
her intentions of setting herself right had not been carried out, and
also that so far as she had gone it had been a failure. Truly, after
the lapse of so many years, the light was still shining in darkness.

In the parlor, after the other company had departed, Ester found
herself the sole companion of Mr. Foster at the further end of the
long room. Abbie, half sitting, half kneeling on an ottoman near her
father, seemed to be engaged in a very earnest conversation with him,
in which her mother occasionally joined, and at which Ralph appeared
occasionally to laugh; but what was the subject of debate they at
their distance were unable to determine, and at last Mr. Foster turned
to his nearest neighbor.

"And so, Miss Ester, you manufactured me into a minister at our first
meeting?"

In view of their nearness to cousinship the ceremony of surname had
been promptly discarded by Mr. Foster, but Ester was un