Nan had observed that her aunt had looked very tired and spent as she went up-stairs after dinner, and understood better than she had before that this visit was moving the waters of Miss Prince’s soul more deeply than had been suspected.  She gained a new sympathy, and as the hours of the summer afternoon went by she thought of a great many things which had not been quite plain to her, and strolled about the garden until she knew that by heart, and had made friends with the disorderly company of ladies-delights and periwinkles which had cropped up everywhere, as if the earth were capable of turning itself into such small blossoms without anybody’s help, after so many years of unvarying tuition.  The cherry-trees and pear-trees had a most venerable look, and the plum-trees were in dismal mourning of black knots.  There was a damp and shady corner where Nan found a great many lilies of the valley still lingering, though they had some time ago gone out of bloom in the more sunshiny garden at Oldfields.  She remembered that there were no flowers in the house and gathered a great handful at last of one sort and another to carry in.

The dining-room was very dark, and Nan wished at first to throw open the blinds which had been carefully closed.  It seemed too early in the summer to shut out the sunshine, but it seemed also a little too soon to interfere with the housekeeping, and so she brought two or three tall champagne glasses from a high shelf of the closet and filled them with her posies, and after putting them in their places, went back to the garden.  There was a perfect silence in the house, except for the sound of the tall clock in the dining-room, and it seemed very lonely.  She had taken another long look at her father’s portrait, but as she shut the rusty-hinged garden gate after her, she smiled at the thought of her unusual idleness, and wondered if it need last until Tuesday, which was the day she had fixed upon for her departure.  Nan wished that she dared to go away for a long walk; it was a pity she had not told her aunt of a wish to see something of the town and of the harbor-side that afternoon, but it would certainly be a little strange if she were to disappear, and very likely the long nap would soon come to an end.  Being well taught in the details of gardening, she took a knife from her pocket and pruned and trained the shrubs and vines, and sang softly to herself as she thought about her next winter’s study and her plans for the rest of the summer, and also decided that she would insist upon the doctor’s going away with her for a journey when she reached home again.

After a little while she heard her aunt open the blinds of the garden door and call her in most friendly tones, and when she reached the house Miss Prince was in the south parlor entertaining a visitor,—­Captain Walter Parish, who had gladly availed himself of some trifling excuse of a business nature, which involved the signing and sending of a paper by the early post of next day.  He was going to his daughter’s to tea, and it was quite a long drive to her house, so he had not dared to put off his errand, he explained, lest he should be detained in the evening.  But he had been also longing to take a look at Miss Prince’s guest.  His wife went to another church and he dutifully accompanied her, though he had been brought up with Miss Prince at old St. Ann’s.