Fanny was glad to leave her dangerous cousin at home, especially after Mr. Bellamy decided to join their party at Saratoga; and as she carried great weight with both her parents it was finally decided to let Lucy remain at Prospect Hill in peace, and one morning in July she saw the family depart without a single feeling of regret that she was not of their number. She had far too much on her hands to spend her time in regretting anything: there was the parish school to visit, and a class of children to hear, children who were no longer ragged, for Lucy’s money had been expended till even Arthur had remonstrated with her, and read her a long lecture on the subject of misapplied charity. Then there was Widow Hobbs waiting for the jelly which Lucy had promised, and for the chapter which Lucy now read to her, sitting where she could watch the road and see just who turned the corner, her voice always sounding a little more serious and good when the footsteps belonged to Arthur Leighton, and her eyes always glancing at the bit of a cracked mirror on the wall, to see that her dress and hair and ribbons were right before Arthur came in. It was a very pretty sight to see her thus and hear her as she read to the poor, whose surroundings she had so greatly improved; and Arthur always smiled gratefully upon her, and then walked back with her to Prospect Hill, where he lingered while she played or talked to him, or brought the luscious fruits with which the garden abounded. This was Lucy’s life, which she preferred to Saratoga, and they left her to enjoy it, somewhat to Arthur’s discomfiture, for, much as he valued her society, he would rather she had gone where the Hethertons did, for he could not be insensible to the remarks which were being made by the curious villagers, who watched this new flirtation, as they called it, and wondered if their minister had forgotten Anna Ruthven. He had not forgotten her, and many a time was her loved name upon his lips and a thought of her in his heart, while he never returned from an interview with Lucy that he did not contrast the two, and sigh for the olden time when Anna was his coworker instead of pretty Lucy Harcourt. And yet there was about the latter a powerful fascination which he found it hard to resist. It rested him just to look at her, she was so fresh, so bright, and so beautiful; and then she flattered his self-love by the unbounded deference she paid to his opinions, studying all his tastes and bringing her will into perfect subjection to his, until she could scarcely be said to have a thought or feeling which was not a reflection of his own. And so the flirtation, which at first had been a one-sided affair, began to assume a more serious form, and the rector went oftener to Prospect Hill, while the Hetherton carriage stood daily at the gate of the parsonage, and people talked and gossiped, until Captain Humphreys, Anna’s grandfather, concluded it was his duty as senior warden of St.