mine!" she managed to say in a faint voice and with a catch
in her throat.

"I had not supposed so," Parson Endicott answered gravely. "I came to
tell you, Miss Marvin, that Mr. Samuel Rosewarne and I have agreed to
recognise your claim. By so doing we shall be piously observing his
father's wishes, and--er--I anticipate no opposition from my
fellow-members on the Board. The school--you have already paid it a
visit, perhaps? No? It will, I venture to think, exceed your
expectations. The school is furnished and ready. I suggest--if the other
Managers consent--that we open it formally on Tuesday next, with a short
religious service, consecrating, so to speak, your future labours.
Yours is a wonderful sphere of usefulness, Miss Marvin; and may I say what
pleasure it gives me to learn that you are a Churchwoman. A regular
communicant, I hope?"

Hester was silent. She disliked this man, and saw no reason to be hurried
into making any confession to him.

"It is a point upon which I am accustomed to lay great stress. In these
days, with schismatics on all hands to contend against, it behoves all
members of the true Church to show a bold and united front." He leaned
his head on one side and looked at her interrogatively. "Do you play the
harmonium?" he asked.

But at this point Mr. Sam thrust his head out through the counting-house
doorway, and the parson coughed discreetly, as much as to say that the
answer might wait.

"Well, Miss Marvin," said Mr. Sam jocosely, "we've fixed it up for you
between us!"

Hester thanked them both briefly, and wished them good-day.

"She dresses respectably," said the parson, when the two were left alone.
"I detect a certain earnestness in her, though I cannot say as yet how far
it is based on genuine religious principles."

"She is more comely than I expected," said Mr. Sam.

At the ferry Hester found Nuncey awaiting her with a boat-load of the
Benny children.

"I reckoned you'd be here just-about-now," Nuncey hailed her.
"Come'st along for a bathe wi' the children! I've a-brought a bathin'
suit for 'ee."

"But I can't swim," Hester answered in alarm, and added, as she stepped
into the boat, "Nuncey, don't laugh at me, but until to-day I had never
seen the sea in my life."

Nuncey looked her up and down quizzically. "And I've never seen Lunnon!
Never mind, my dear; 'tisn' too late to begin. There's none of this crew
knows how to swim but me and Tenny here," she p