ig as our'n."

My father awoke--rubbed his eyes--became aware of a lady's
presence--rubbed them again, and sat staring.

John led Ursula to the old man's chair.

"Mr. Fletcher, this is Miss March, a friend of mine, who, hearing I was
ill, out of her great kindness--"

His voice faltered. Miss March added, in a low tone, with downcast
eyelids:

"I am an orphan, and he was kind to my dear father."

Abel Fletcher nodded--adjusted his spectacles--eyed her all over--and
nodded again; slowly, gravely, with a satisfied inspection. His hard
gaze lingered, and softened while it lingered, on that young face,
whereon was written simplicity, dignity, truth.

"If thee be a friend of John's, welcome to my house. Wilt thee sit
down?"

Offering his hand, with a mixture of kindness and ceremonious grace
that I had never before seen in my Quaker father, he placed her in his
own arm-chair. How well I remember her sitting there, in her black
silk pelisse, trimmed with the white fur she was so fond of wearing,
and her riding-hat, the soft feathers of which drooped on her shoulder,
trembling as she trembled. For she did tremble very much.

Gradually the old man's perception opened to the facts before him. He
ceased his sharp scrutiny, and half smiled.

"Wilt thee stay, and have a dish of tea with us?"

So it came to pass, I hardly remember how, that in an hour's space our
parlour beheld the strangest sight it had beheld since--Ah, no wonder
that when she took her place at the table's foot, and gave him his dish
of tea with her own hand--her pretty ringed lady's hand--my old father
started, as if it had been another than Miss March who was sitting
there. No wonder that, more than once, catching the sound of her low,
quiet, gentlewomanlike speech, different from any female voices here,
he turned round suddenly with a glance, half-scared, half-eager, as if
she had been a ghost from the grave.

But Mrs. Jessop engaged him in talk, and, woman-hater as he was, he
could not resist the pleasantness of the doctor's little wife. The
doctor, too, came in after tea, and the old folk all settled themselves
for a cosy chat, taking very little notice of us three.

Miss March sat at a little table near the window, admiring some
hyacinths that Mrs. Jessop had brought us. A wise present: for all
Norton Bury knew that if Abel Fletcher had a soft place in his heart it
was for his garden and his flowers. These were very lovely; in colou