March had seen Mrs. Wayt in church that forenoon, and been struck anew with her delicate loveliness. Could she, with that Madonna face, be a stern task-mistress? With the rise of difficulties, his desire to paint the picture increased. That this unfortunate child, with the artist soul shining piteous through her big eyes, should see the fair creation grow under his hand had become a matter of moment. As poor Hester’s effort to express acquiescence or dissent died in a hysterical gurgle, and a shamed attempt to hide her hot face with her hands, the tender-hearted fellow arose to take leave. “I won’t urge my petition until you have had time to think it over. But I don’t withdraw it. May I bring my sister over to see you both? She is fond of pictures, too, and dabbles in watercolors on her own account. Excuse me—and Thor—for our unintentionally unceremonious introduction to your notice, and thank you for a delightful half-hour. Good-afternoon!” Hetty looked after him, as his elastic stride measured off the orchard slope—a contradiction of strange mortification and strange delight warring within her. It was as if a young sun-god had paused in the entrance of a gruesome cave, and talked familiarly with the prisoners chained to the walls. With all her resolute purpose to oppose the intimacy which she foresaw must arise from the proposed scheme of picture-making, she could not ignore the straining of her spirit upon her bonds. “Oh!” wailed Hester, lowering her hands, “I didn’t mean to be so foolish! I will be brave and sensible, but you know, Hetty, I have never had anything like this offered to me before. It is like dying with thirst with water before one’s eyes, to give it up. And when he said: ‘Blossom-time is short,’ it rushed over me that I never had any—I can never have any. I am just a withered, useless, ugly bud that will never be a flower.” An agony of sobs followed. “My precious one!” Hetty’s tears flowed with hers. “Do I ever forget your sorrows? Are you listening, dear? If possible, you shall have this one poor little pleasure. You must trust your mother’s love and mine, to deny you nothing we can safely give. If we must refuse, it is only bearing a little more!” The going out of the May day was calm as with remembered happiness, but the chill that lurks in the imperfectly tempered air of the newborn season, awaiting the departure of the sun, was so pronounced by seven o’clock that Hetty called upon Homer to build a fire in the sitting room, where she and Hester were sitting. The children were sent to bed at eight o’clock. Mrs. Wayt was lying down in her chamber with one of her frequent headaches, rallying her forces against her husband’s return from the long walk he found necessary “to work off the cumulative electricity unexpended by the day’s services.” “I belong to the peripatetic school of philosophy,” he said to a parishioner whom he met two miles from home.