Posey hesitated a moment. “No, ma’am, I guess not. She gave me plenty to eat, but she scolded me from morning till night, and wanted me to work every minute. If she wasn’t always cruel she was never kind—” She paused and looked from face to face—“and now I’m away from her I’m going to stay away. The landlady at the hotel at Byfield will give me a dollar a week to wash dishes, but I wish you knew of some other place where I could live. I’d do everything I could to help, and I’d be real good. I’m not bad always, indeed I’m not.” She did not say, “If I might only stay here,” but her wistful eyes expressed the unspoken wish. “Silence,” Mrs. Blossom spoke quickly, “will you go out in the orchard and get some sweet apples to bake; and Posey can go with you.” “Now, mother,” Miss Silence laid down in her lap the work she held, “I don’t think it’s quite fair to send the child away while you and Grandmother talk her over, for she knows as well as I that’s what you would do. There’s only one thing _I_ shall consent to—that she stay here till a suitable place is found for her.” “Thee will always be the same impulsive, impetuous Silence as long as thee lives.” Grandmother Sweet’s face crinkled in a smile. Though an attentive listener she had not spoken before. She turned to her daughter, “I have nothing to say for my part, Elizabeth, that the young girl might not hear, indeed that I would not prefer she should hear. “And in the first place, my dear,” to Posey, “thee is not free from blame thyself; from thy own words thee has failed in duty to one older than thyself, and yielded to the angry passion of thine own heart, and thus, it well may be, has failed of the lesson God meant for thee. For always remember, child, God puts us in no place he will not give us strength to fill, or sends us no trial that will not be for our good if rightly endured. At the same time if thy story is true, and thee has a truthful look, I do not think thee has been justly or rightly treated, or that thy return would be wise or best.” Then turning again to her daughter, “The leading of the Lord seems to have brought her to our door. What is thy mind, Elizabeth?” “Thee has spoken it exactly,” answered Mrs. Blossom, who often used the Friends’ language in talking with her mother. “As thee says, she seems to have been led to us, and I hope the time will never come when any of God’s children find ours a closed door.” “Oh, if you will let me stay I’ll do my very best!” cried Posey. “Do you know I said yesterday that I didn’t believe God cared anything for me, but Ben Pancost said He did, that probably God sent him to help me then, and that He would take care of me again to-day, and I just think He has.” “Dear child,” and Grandmother Sweet put one of her soft, tremulous hands on Posey’s head, “God’s love and care is over thee always; never doubt it, even if thee has not the outward evidence.”