"No, no! I never thought so," said Mrs. Bowyer. "I never intended--dear Mrs. Turner, we all appreciate your motives. I hope you will let us see much of you, and that we may become very good friends. But Mary--it is her first grief, don't you know?" said the vicar's wife, with the tears in her eyes; "she has always been so much cared for, so much thought of all her life--and then all at once! You will not think that we misunderstand your kind motives; but it is more than she can bear. She made up her mind in a hurry, without thinking. You must not be annoyed if we take her away." Mrs. Turner had been looking from one to another while this dialogue went on. She said now, a little wounded, "I wished only to do what was kind; but, perhaps I was thinking most of my own child. Miss Vivian must do what she thinks best." "You are all kind--too kind," Mary cried; "but no one must say another word, please. Unless Mrs. Turner should send me away, until I know what this all means, it is my place to stay here." IX. It was Lady Mary who had come into the vicarage that afternoon when Mrs. Bowyer supposed some one had called. She wandered about to a great many places in these days, but always returned to the scenes in which her life had been passed, and where alone her work could be done, if it could be done at all. She came in and listened while the tale of her own carelessness and heedlessness was told, and stood by while her favorite was taken to another woman's bosom for comfort, and heard everything and saw everything. She was used to it by this time; but to be nothing is hard, even when you are accustomed to it; and though she knew that they would not hear her, what could she do but cry out to them as she stood there unregarded? "Oh, have pity upon me!" Lady Mary said; and the pang in her heart was so great that the very atmosphere was stirred, and the air could scarcely contain her and the passion of her endeavor to make herself known, but thrilled like a harp-string to her cry. Mrs. Bowyer heard the jar and tingle in the inanimate world, but she thought only that it was some charitable visitor who had come in, and gone softly away again at the sound of tears.