t happened that one evening after the three
girls, Olive, Myrtle, and Bathsheba, had been together at the Parsonage,
and Cyprian, availing himself of a brother's privilege, had joined them,
he found he had been talking most of the evening with the gentle girl
whose voice had grown so soft and sweet, during her long ministry in
the sick-chamber, that it seemed to him more like music than speech. It
would not be fair to say that Myrtle was piqued to see that Cyprian was
devoting himself to Bathsheba. Her ambition was already reaching beyond
her little village circle, and she had an inward sense that Cyprian
found a form of sympathy in the minister's simple-minded daughter which
he could not ask from a young woman of her own aspirations.

Such was the state of affairs when Master Byles Gridley was one morning
surprised by an early call from Myrtle. He had a volume of Walton's
Polyglot open before him, and was reading Job in the original, when she
entered.

"Why, bless me, is that my young friend Miss Myrtle Hazard?" he
exclaimed. "I might call you Keren-Happuch, which is Hebrew for Child of
Beauty, and not be very far out of the way, Job's youngest daughter,
my dear. And what brings my young friend out in such good season this
morning? Nothing going wrong up at our ancient mansion, The Poplars, I
trust?"

"I want to talk with you, dear Master Gridley," she answered. She looked
as if she did not know just how to begin.

"Anything that interests you, Myrtle, interests me. I think you have
some project in that young head of yours, my child. Let us have it, in
all its dimensions, length, breadth, and thickness. I think I can guess,
Myrtle, that we have a little plan of some kind or other. We don't visit
Papa Job quite so early as this without some special cause,--do we, Miss
Keren-Happuch?"

"I want to go to the city--to school," Myrtle said, with the directness
which belonged to her nature.

"That is precisely what I want you to do myself, Miss Myrtle Hazard. I
don't like to lose you from the village, but I think we must spare you
for a while."

"You're the best and dearest man that ever lived. What could have made
you think of such a thing for me, Mr. Gridley?"

"Because you are ignorant, my child,--partly I want to see you fitted to
take a look at the world without feeling like a little country miss. Has
your aunt Silence promised to bear your expenses while you are in the
city? It will cost a good deal of money."