Lord."

Once Mr. Clare missed a word, and paused for aid. She was crying too
much to be ready, and, through her tears, could not recover the passage
so as to prompt him before he had himself recalled the verse. Perhaps a
sense of failure was always good for Rachel, but she was much concerned,
and her apologies quite distressed Mr. Clare.

"Dear child, no one could be expected to keep the place when there was
so much to dwell on in the very comfort of the chapter. And now if you
are not in haste, would you take me to the place that dear Bessie spoke
of, by the willow-tree. I am almost afraid little Mary Lawrence's grave
may have left too little space."

Rachel guided him to a lovely spot, almost overhanging the stream, with
the dark calm pools beneath the high bank, and the willow casting a
long morning shadow over it. Her mind went back to the merry drive from
Avoncester, when she had first seen Elizabeth Keith, and had little
dreamt that in one short year she should be choosing the spot for her
grave. Mr. Clare paced the green nook and was satisfied, asking if it
were not a very pretty place.

"Yes," said Rachel, "there is such a quiet freshness, and the
willow-tree seems to guard it."

"Is there not a white foxglove on the bank?"

"Yes, but with only a bell or two left at the top of the side spikes."

"Your aunt sowed the seed. It is strange that I was very near choosing
this place nine years ago, but it could not be seen from my window,
which was an object with me then."

Just then his quick ear detected that some one was at the parsonage
door, and Rachel, turning round, exclaimed with horror, "It is that
unhappy Mr. Carleton."

"Poor young fellow," said Mr. Clare, with more of pity than of anger, "I
had better speak to him."

But they were far from the path, and it was not possible to guide the
blind steps rapidly between the graves and head stones, so that before
the pathway was reached young Carleton must have received the sad reply
to his inquiries, for hurrying from the door he threw himself on his
horse, and rode off at full speed.

By the afternoon, when Colonel Keith came to Bishopsworthy, Alick was
lying on the sofa with such a headache that he could neither see nor
spell, and Rachel was writing letters for him, both in the frame of mind
in which the Colonel's genuine warm affection and admiration for Bessie
was very comforting, assisting them in putting all past misgivings out
of sight. He ha