Jack followed us, but mother called her back, and asked her to go to one of the cottages and fetch Carrie home. Such a glorious sunset met our eyes as we stepped out on the lawn; the clouds were a marvel of rose and violet and golden splendor; the windows of the cottage were glittering with the reflected beams, and a delicious scent of lilies was in the air. Mr. Lucas seemed in one of his grave moods, for he said very little until we reached the winding walk where the ferns were, and then---- I am not going to repeat what he said; such words are too sacred; but it came upon me with the shock of a thunderbolt what he had been telling mother, and what he was trying to make me understood, for I was so stupid that I could not think what he meant by asking me to the Cedars, and when he saw that, he spoke more plainly. "You must come back, Esther; we cannot do without you any longer," he continued very gently, "not as Flurry's governess, but as her mother, and as my wife." He was very patient with me, when he saw how the suddenness and the wonder of it all upset me, that a man like Mr. Lucas could love me, and be so clever and superior and good. How could such a marvelous thing have happened? And mother knew it, and Uncle Geoffrey, for Mr. Lucas had taken advantage of my absence to speak to them both, and they had given him leave to say this to me. Well, there could be no uncertainty in my answer. I already reverenced and venerated him above other men, and the rest came easy, and before we returned to the house the first strangeness and timidity had passed; I actually asked him--summoning up all my courage, however--how it was he could think of me, a mere girl without beauty, or cleverness, or any of the ordinary attractions of girlhood. "I don't know," he answered, and I knew by his voice he was smiling; "it has been coming on a long time; when people know you they don't think you plain, Esther, and to me you can never be so. I first knew what I really felt when I came out of the room that dreadful night, and saw you standing with drenched hair and white face, with Dot in your arms and my precious Flurry clinging to your dress; when I saw you tottering and caught you. I vowed then that you, and none other, should replace Flurry's dead mother;" and when he had said this I asked no more. CHAPTER XXIV. RINGING THE CHANGES. When Mr. Lucas took me to mother, she kissed me and shed abundance of tears. "Oh, my darling, if only your poor father could know of this," she whispered; and when Uncle Geoffrey's turn came he seemed almost as touched. "What on earth are we to do without you, child?" he grumbled, wiping his eye-glasses. "There, go along with you. If ever a girl deserved a good husband and got it, you are the one." "Yes, indeed," sighed mother; "Esther is every one's right hand." But Mr. Lucas sat down by her side and said something so kind and comforting that she soon grew more cheerful, and I went up to Carrie.