"I will go with you first," said Vincent, who contemplated the butterman's shop at that moment through a little halo of gratitude and kindness. He went into the back parlour with the gratified deacon, where Mrs. Tozer sat reading over again the same 'Gazette' in which poor Susan's history was summed up and ended. It seemed like a year to Vincent since he had dined with his mother at this big table, amid the distant odours of all the bacon and cheese. Mrs. Tozer put down the paper, and took off her spectacles as her visitor came in. "It's Mr. Vincent, Phoebe," she said, with a little exclamation. "Dear, dear, I never thought as the pastor would be such a strange sight in my house--not as I was meaning nothing unkind, Tozer, so there's no occasion to look at me. I'm as glad as ever I can be to see the minister; and what a blessing as it's all settled, and the poor dear getting well, too. Phoebe, you needn't be a-hiding behind me, child, as if the pastor was thinking of how you was dressed. She has on her morning wrapper, Mr. Vincent, as she was helping her mother in, and we didn't expect no visitors. Don't be standing there, as if it was any matter to the minister how you was dressed." "Oh, ma, as if I ever thought of such a thing!" said Phoebe, extending a pink uncovered arm out of the loose sleeve of her morning dress to Vincent, and averting her face; "but to see Mr. Vincent is so like old times--and everything has seemed so different--and it is so pleasant to feel as if it were all coming back again. Oh ma! to imagine that I ever supposed Mr. Vincent could notice my dress, or think of poor me!" added Phoebe, in a postscript under her breath. The minister heard the latter words quite as well as the first. After he had shaken the pink, plump hand, he sat down on the opposite side of the table, and saw Phoebe, relieved against the light of the window, wiping a tender tear from her eye. All at once out of the darker and heavier trials which had abstracted him from common life, the young Nonconformist plunged back into the characteristic troubles of his position. As usual, he made no response to Phoebe, found nothing civil to say, but turned with desperation to Mrs. Tozer, who was luckily about to speak.