This evening, Esther Langridge came in, and stayed to supper. She said Ephraim had gone to the Parsonage on business, and had promised to call for her on his way home. He came rather later than Esther expected. (We have only seen him twice since we returned from London, except just meeting at church and so forth: he seemed to be always busy.) He said he had had to see Mr Liversedge, and had been detained later than he thought. He sat and talked to all of us for a while, but I thought his mind seemed somewhere else. I guessed where, and thought I found myself right whet after a time, when Father had come in, and Ambrose with him, and they were all talking over the fire, Ephraim left them, and coming across to my corner, asked me first thing if I had heard anything from Annas. I have not had a line from her, nor heard anything of her, and he looked disappointed when I said so. He was silent for a minute, and then he said,-- "Cary, what do you think I have been making up my mind to do?" "I do not know, Ephraim," said I. I did not see how that could have to do with Annas, for I believed he had made up his mind on that subject long ago. "Would you be very much surprised if I told you that I mean to take holy orders?" "Ephraim!" I was very, very much surprised. How would Annas like it? "Yes, I thought you would be," said he. "It is no new idea to me. But I had to get my father's consent, and smooth away two or three difficulties, before I thought it well to mention it to any one but the Vicar. He will give me a title. I am to be ordained, Cary, next Trinity Sunday." "Why, that is almost here!" cried I. "Yes, it is almost here," he replied, with that far-away look in his eyes which I had seen now and then. Then Annas had been satisfied, for of course she was one of the difficulties which had to be smoothed away. "I shall hope to see more of my friends now," he went on, with a smile. "I know I have seemed rather a hermit of late, while this matter has been trembling in the balance. I hope the old friend will not be further off because he is the curate. I should not like that." "I do not think you need fear," said I, trying to speak lightly. But how far my heart went down! The future master of the Fells Farm was a fixture at Brocklebank: but the future parson of some parish might be carried a hundred miles away from us. A few months, and we might see him no more. Just then, Father set his foot on one of the great logs, and it blazed and crackled, sending a shower of sparkles up the chimney, and a ruddy glow all over the room. But my fire was dying out, and the sparkles were gone already. Perhaps it was as well that just at that moment a rather startling diversion occurred, by the entrance of Sam with a letter, which he gave to Flora.