do so, it was quite as a bargain with Providence
that no losses through ill-health or misfortunes
should come upon them. She would scarcely
spend a farthing upon herself. She wore no
flowers, or flounces, or ribbons, like other girls;
yet with all that, and the fine faint lines upon
her face— which nobody could see so well as I
did, who knew her poor dear mother— she was by
far the prettiest young lady that attended our
chapel, when Katie was away.

The young minister— the second since Mr.
Ambery resigned— took a fancy to Rebecca.
It was edifying, even to me who knew her little
faults, to see her at public worship, with her dark
eyes downcast, and the beautiful long lashes lying
over on her cheeks, as still and quiet as on a
baby's sleeping face. The minister never caught
her eye wandering, nor even lifted up to himself
until he read out his text, and then they fixed
on him with a steady, serious gaze, as if he was
some angel from heaven, who could have no
earthly thoughts of love or anything of that sort.

Never had a young minister so much need of
counsel from his elder pastor. I saw Mr. Craig
rambling down our street most days, a studious-
looking, thoughtful young man, the very man
to win our Rebecca; and, as I watched him out
of sight, I could often have cried with the
earnest wish I had that all might go smoothly
with them, and that they might get comfortably
married before all the nature was worn out of
them with the troubles of this weary world.

Early one morning, while I was mixing my
dough for the breakfast-rolls, the shop-bell
rang furiously, and who should rush through
into my bakehouse but Rebecca, with nothing
on her head save a shawl! We were used to
run to and fro in that fashion after nightfall,
but never in the daylight, with the eyes of the
street upon us; and there she stood, gasping
for breath, with her hand pressed against her
bosom, and her large dark eyes looking larger and
blacker from the ashy paleness of her face. My
own heart beat at the sight of her till I could
not speak, and we stood staring at one another
in silence, as if the last day was come.

"Your father," I gasped out at last.

"He is asleep," she muttered with difficulty;
"I haven't told him, nor Nellie."

"Katie!" I cried.

"No, no," she answered, "she is all right."
And I leaned my head down upon my floury
hands, and cried for very joy; for I had thought
of nothing but, that one of them was dead.

So I took Rebecca into my little kitchen, all
trembling and shivering as she was, and set her
down in my mother's arm-chair upon the hearth,
keeping her hand pressed hard upon her heart
to quiet its beating, till the colour began to come
back into her face, and the sobs died away so that
she could speak.

"Mary," she said, in a grand reasoning sort of
way, as if she was setting me up for a judge
"you have known us all our lives. Have we ever
been like other girls, flaunting, and idle, and
extravagant? Have I not kept myself and my
sisters aloof from all evil as carefully as my
mother would have done? I have given a tenth
of all our income to the poor."

"My dear," I interrupted, for though I was
proud of her and the other two, I did not like
to hear her talk in that manner, ''there are no
young ladies equal to you in all the town. But
what ever is the matter?"

"Listen," she said, and she read to me a
lawyer's letter, with a great many whereases
and not withstandings in it; but the pith of it,
as I could make it out, was, that the old
scoundrel, Mr. Corbett, Joshua's master, gave
notice to Mr. Ambery that he had the sum of
eleven hundred pounds to pay on that day six
months. Red as my face was from the heat of
the oven, I felt it going as pale as Rebecca's
own.

"My dear," I whispered, for it seemed too
dreadful to speak about aloud, " how is it?
What is the meaning of it?"

"I hardly know," she said; "all I can understand
is, that my father was made a trustee to a
marriage settlement belonging to a cousin of
Mr. Corbett's, more than thirty years ago; and
this money was left in my father's hands, or Mr.
Corbett is trying to make out that it was. Do
you know, Mary, that the interest for five hundred
pounds, at only four per cent, will come to
six hundred. I have done that sum in my head
already— oh! a hundred times. Eleven hundred
pounds!"

We sat speechless some minutes after that,
till Rebecca burst out again crying, and wringing
her hands.

"Oh! I wish I was a man," she sobbed; " I
wish I understood law and business! I know it
is wrong! I know it is cheatery! But what
can we do against Mr. Corbett?"

"Why does he come upon us now, after all
these years?" I asked.

"His cousin is just dead," she answered.
"Mr. Corbett is executor of his will, and is
winding up his affairs, I suppose. Eleven
hundred pounds, Mary!"

There were no breakfast-rolls made that morning.
I went down home with Rebecca; and
she carried her father's breakfast up-stairs to
bed as usual; and we waited as patiently as we
could, till he was dressed, and had finished his
own private prayers, which seemed longer than
ever that day. But he came down stairs at
length, looking so calm and tranquil, with his
thin white hair brushed back from his kindly
face, that the moment Rebecca saw him she
ran and threw her arms round his neck, and
leaning her head upon his breast, wept there as
she had never done before.

We should have told Mr. Ambery at once, for
Rebecca's strange conduct alarmed him, but his
first thought, like mine, was that something had
happened to Katie. There was a letter from
the child to her eldest sister, left unopened on
the table, for the lawyer's letter had caught
Rebecca's eye first; but now she broke the seal,
and read it out aloud in a dry hard voice— such
a letter! for it had been written in a merry, yet
timid, fluttering confidence, telling what the