Katherine drew a long breath, and her eyes were still misty.  “How long the waiting time must seem to Mary, and the months can bring her no tidings of what she most wants to know.”

“That is true; but I am quite sure it is good for her,” Mr. Selincourt answered.  “Never before has there been anything in her life which called for waiting or patience, and it is the lessons which are hardest to learn which do us most good.”

“Won’t Mary be displeased because you have told me all this?” asked Katherine.

“It will make no difference to her if she does not know, and you are not the sort of girl to go about bragging of the things you have been told.  But it seemed to me that it might help you to an understanding of Mary’s character if you knew,” Mr. Selincourt replied rather awkwardly.

Katherine flushed a sudden, uncomfortable red, and began measuring calico in a great hurry; only, as she had turned her work round, and was doing it all over again, it was rather wasted labour.  A thought had flashed into her mind that perhaps this good, kindly man had heard some of the talk which was coupling the names of Miss Selincourt and Jervis Ferrars, and so had told her this about Mary of set purpose.

“Thank you for telling me,” she said; then went on hurriedly:  “I am so glad to know.  It explains why sometimes Mary does not look happy.  I had thought it just boredom and discontent.”

“Most people would think so, but that is just because they don’t understand her.  She is made of fine, good stuff at the bottom, only sometimes it is rather hard to get at.  This week she will be perfectly happy and charming to live with, because she will have to be at the fish sheds all the time, checking the incoming boats; and next week she will be down in the dumps, because she has nothing in the world to do.”

“That at least is a complaint that I am in no danger of suffering from,” laughed Katherine, as, realizing that she had been working twice on the calico, she folded it up and started on another length.

“And I have been wasting your time in a fearful fashion; but perhaps you will forgive me, because I like talking to you so much,” he said, rising from his seat and laughing, as he looked at his watch, to think how the morning had flown.  “Now I will go and talk to your good father for a little while, and then I will whistle for Pierre to come over and row me down to Seal Cove for lunch with Mary, to round off the morning.”

Katherine rushed about the store with great vigour and much bustling energy after the visitor had betaken himself outside.  Of course he had wasted her morning to a serious extent, but what mattered arrears of work compared with the peace of mind the talk had brought her?  Never once since the day on which her father had confided to her the secret trouble which was weighing him down had Katherine been so light-hearted.  Now, at least so far as she was