n the cash. He has narrowly escaped
prosecution--so I hear."

"Oh, George, then our suspicions about that little cash-box are right!"

"It looks like it," George said, as Patience's eyes shone with a
wonderful light of hope. "It looks like it; and when the boy comes
home, we will see his character cleared."

"_When_ he comes home! Oh, another 'when,' another waiting time!"
Patience sighed out, "There is a word which gives me comfort, however,
and I am always hearing it, as if it were whispered to me: 'If it
tarry, wait for it.'"

"You find waiting easier than I do," George said.

"Easy!" she said, clasping her hands together. "Easy! oh, only God
knows how hard!"

Then she turned sorrowfully away from him, and pursued her way alone to
look for Bet.

CHAPTER XII.

_THE SPIRIT OF PEACE._

Bet had been sent on an errand for her grandmother, and when Patience
came up to her she was laden with a heavy basket of market produce.
She was bending under the weight she carried, and as Patience joined
her she set down the basket and wiped her hot face with her
handkerchief.

"Is little Miss Joy worse?" she asked eagerly, "I couldn't come early,
for grandmother wanted me to scrub out the room Joe uses, and the
passage; and then I had to change my frock and go to the market. I met
the girls going to Miss Bayliff's, and they laughed at me, and said
they supposed I was so clever I had left school because there was no
more to learn; and they laughed and jeered at me as they daren't have
done if little Miss Joy had been there. But as she loves me a little,
and never laughs at me, I don't mind."

"I thought I should meet you, Bet, and I came along to tell you some
news."

"Not that Jack is come? Oh my!"

"No; my wanderer is not come home; but another has--your Aunt Maggie."

Bet stared in Mrs. Harrison's face with open mouth.

"My Aunt Maggie! she that went away! I have got her picture in a box.
I showed it to little Miss Joy that last evening she was ever running
about, and she came home with me."

"Bet, that Aunt Maggie is Joy's mother."

"How do you know?"

"She is with Joy now. I have left them together."

"Are you come to tell grannie? She has been so mopy since the wedding.
Uncle Joe had a breeze with her just before he married. She says she
can't get along living in this house alone with me. Come and see her,
do; and tell her about Aunt Maggie. I think you must tell her that."

"But I d