"Just now, dear, I was in my room upstairs, feeling very, very unhappy; I'm not sure but I was sobbing nearly as much as you were just now. 'He will never come back,' I said to myself; 'he is lost to us for ever.' At that moment those sweet bells broke out, calling people to Heaven's service, and I don't know why, Lena, but they seemed to whisper a great comfort to me. They seemed to say that God was over us all, and saw our trouble, and would heal it in His good time." Lena stared a little, digesting what she could of the words. The tears were nowhere. "Will He send Hugh back?" "I can't tell, darling. He can take care of Hugh, and bless him, and keep him, wherever he may be, and I know He _will_. If He should have taken him to heaven above the blue sky--oh then, Hugh must be very happy. He will be with the angels. He will see Jesus face to face; and you know how _He_ loved little children. The bells seemed to say all this to me as I listened to them, Lena." Lena went off contented: we saw her skipping along by Hannah's side, who had on a new purple gown and staring red and green trimmings to her bonnet. Children are as changeable as a chameleon, sobbing one minute, laughing the next. Tod was standing now with his back to the window, and Mrs. Todhetley sat by the table, her long thin fingers supporting her cheek; very meek, very, very patient. Tod was thinking so as he glanced at her. "How you must hate me for this!" he said. "Oh, Joseph! Hate you?" "The thing is all my fault. A great deal has been my fault for a long while; all the unpleasantness and the misunderstanding." She got up and took his hand timidly, as if she feared he might think it too great a liberty. "If you can only understand me for the future, Joseph; understand how I wish and try to make things pleasant to you, I shall be fully repaid: to you most especially in all the house, after your father. I have ever striven and prayed for it." He answered nothing for the moment; his face was working a little, and he gave her fingers a grip that must have caused pain. "If the worst comes of this, and Hugh never is amongst us again, I will go over the seas in the wake of the villain Arne," he said in a low, firm tone, "and spare you the sight of me." Tears began to trickle down her face. "Joseph, my dear--if you will let me call you so--this shall draw us near to each other, as we never might have been drawn without it. You shall not hear a word of reproach from us, or any word but love; there shall never be a thought of reproach in my heart. I have had a great deal of sorrow in my life, Joseph, and have learnt patiently to bear, leaving all things to Heaven." "And if Hugh is dead?" "What I said to Lena, I meant," she softly whispered. "If God has taken him he is with the angels, far happier than he could be in this world of care, though his lot were of the brightest." The tears were running down her cheeks as she went out of the room. Tod stood still as a stone.