Let it be written here, lest our meaning be misinterpreted, that Harriet Wesden had improved vastly with all this--was a better, more energetic, and devout woman. If she went _too often_ to church--that is quite possible--if she were a trifle "high" and pinned her faith on decorations, if she thought the world all vanity and vexation of spirit, if she were a little proud of carrying outward and visible signs of her own inward and spiritual grace, if she even neglected her father, at times--poor old Wesden, who sadly needed cheerful society now--still the end was good, and she was at her best then. Serious people _will_ appear a little disagreeable to people who are not serious--but then what do serious people think of their mundane critics, or care for them? Harriet Wesden fancied that she had set herself apart from the world--that its vanities and belongings scarcely had power to arrest her steady upward progress. It did not strike her that whilst she remained in the world, the sorrows, joys, and histories of its denizens must have power to affect her. Sidney Hinchford had mistrusted her--the man for whom she had been anxious to make sacrifices, had refused them, and discredited their genuineness; her only friend, in whom she thought there could not be a possibility of guile, had supplanted her. From that hour let her set herself apart from them; bear no ill-feeling towards them, but keep to her new world. Her life was not their lives, and they were best away from her. After that set in more strongly the seriousness to which we have alluded, and all former trace of Harriet Wesden's old self submerged for good--and all. Mattie and Harriet met at times; Mattie would not give up the old friend, the girl she had loved so long and faithfully. Despite the new reserve--even austerity--that had suddenly sprung up, Mattie called at regular intervals, took her place between Harriet and Mr. Wesden, and spoke for a while of the old times. Harriet's manner puzzled her, but there seemed no chance of an explanation of it. Her quick observation detected Harriet's new ideas of life's duties, and she did not intrude upon them, or utter one word by way of argument, or in opposition. It happened, sometimes, that Harriet would be absent during Mattie's visits--"gone to church," old Wesden would say, ruefully--and Mattie would take her place by the deserted father's side, and play the part of daughter to him till Harriet's return.