urned, dropping
her hand, and going quickly into the road. As I did so, I heard Leah's
smooth voice address Gladys:

'You were so, late, ma'am, that I thought I had better step down to the
cottage, for fear you might be waiting for me.'

'It is all right, Leah,' was Gladys's answer. 'Miss Garston walked back
with me. Thank you for your thoughtfulness.' And then I heard their
footsteps dying away in the distance.

CHAPTER XXXV

NIGHTINGALES AND ROSES

I was very busy the next morning. I went round to the Marshalls' cottage
to see Peggy, and then I paid Phoebe a long visit, and afterwards I went
to Robert Stokes.

They seemed all glad to welcome me back, especially Phoebe, who lay and
looked at me as though she never wished to lose sight of me again.

When I had left her room I sat a little while with Susan. She still
looked delicate, but at my first pitying word she stopped me.

'Please don't say that, Miss Garston. If you knew how I thank God for
that illness! it has opened poor Phoebe's heart to me as nothing else
could have opened it.'

'She does indeed seem a different creature,' I returned, full of
thankfulness to hear this.

'Different,--nay, that is not the word: the heart of a little child has
come back to her. It rests me now, if I am ever so tired, to go into her
room. It is always "Sit down, Susan, my woman, and talk to me a bit," or
she will beg me to do something for her, just as though she were asking a
favour. I read the Bible to her now morning and evening, and Kitty sings
her sweet hymns to us. It is more like home now, with Phoebe to smile
a welcome whenever she sees me. I do not miss father and mother half so
much now.'

'If you only knew how happy it makes me to hear you say all this, Miss
Locke!'

'Nay, but I am thinking we owe much of our comfort to you,' she answered
simply. 'You worked upon her feelings first, and then Providence sent
that sharp message to her. And we have to be grateful to the doctor, too.
What do you think, Miss Garston? He is our landlord now, and he won't
take a farthing of rent from us. He says we are doing him a kindness by
living in the house, and that he only wished his other tenants took as
much care of his property; but of course I know what that means.' And
here Susan's thin hands shook a little. 'The doctor is just a man whose
right hand does not know what his left hand does; he is just heaping us
with benefits, and making us ashamed with his ki