"Yes, and I like to go very well, but I get very sleepy during the sermon, especially when we go with Miss Robina. I try to listen sometimes; but of course all that is meant for grown-up people, and I don't understand it." "Were you not just telling Mr St. Cyr that you are grown up? But I think you are very stupid to bother about it. If people say their prayers and are nice and obliging, and all that, I think that is quite enough. I am sure mama is good, and so is Selina, and what is the use talking so much about religion, _as_ though that would make any difference?" "Yes, mama is good, and Selina, but I am not, at least very often I am not. And there must be some way of finding out what is wrong and what is right." "Of course there is--your own conscience," said Tessie, triumphantly. "Hasn't Mrs Glencairn often told you?" Frederica shook her head. "But there must be something more than that. I wish I knew." "Say your prayers and go to church, that is religion, everybody knows. But to be good and nice is something quite different. I think you are very silly, with all your wishes and talking, and I beg you won't say anything to Selina about it. She thinks of things afterwards, and you are not to vex her. And don't look like that, or I shall wish you had gone to church with Mr St. Cyr. But you will forget all about it before to-morrow. That is one comfort." "Very likely; but that does not prove anything;" said Frederica. "Everybody ought to have some kind of religion; and sometimes, when I used to see Miss Baines so happy in the midst of all her pain and trouble, I thought of poor mama, and wished that she could know all about it. But I won't say anything to Selina just yet." "No, nor ever, unless you are a goose. Here we are at home. Won't they be glad?" And the little girl ran up the broad stone steps, and danced out her impatience while she was made to wait for the opening of the door. "No," said Frederica, as she stood at her side; "I am not going to spoil our visit with religion, at any rate; and I daresay you are right, Tessie, and I may forget all about it before the week is over." CHAPTER THREE. Easter fell late this year. The grass on the sheltered lawn was already green, and there were many budding things in the borders; and with the sunshine falling on them so warm and bright, it almost seemed to the children like a summer day. Tessie could not resist the temptation to run down the steps again, to peep through the wires and over the low cedar hedge at the crocuses and snowdrops beyond: "We shall have cold days enough yet," she said as she came back; "but I need not spoil to-day thinking about them. It is just like summer to-day." "We shall make a summer day in the house to mama and Selina, that is-- and to the children--and to Madame Marie Pauline Precoe Ascot, too, if she will let us; to the rest, whether she will or not."