Just at this moment Mary’s clear voice at the door announced that tea was on the table.

“Coming, this very minute,” said Miss Prissy, bustling up and pulling off her spectacles.  Then, running across the room, she shut the door mysteriously, and turned to Mrs. Scudder with the air of an impending secret.  Miss Prissy was subject to sudden impulses of confidence, in which she was so very cautious that not the thickest oak-plank door seemed secure enough, and her voice dropped to its lowest key.  The most important and critical words were entirely omitted, or supplied by a knowing wink and a slight stamp of the foot.

In this mood she now approached Mrs. Scudder, and, holding up her hand on the door-side to prevent consequences, if, after all she should be betrayed into a loud word, she said, “I thought I’d just say, Miss Scudder, that, in case Mary should ——­ the Doctor,—­in case, you know, there should be a ——­ in the house, you must just contrive it so as to give me a month’s notice, so that I could give you a whole fortnight to fix her up as such a good man’s ——­ ought to be.  Now I know how spiritually-minded our blessed Doctor is; but, bless you, Ma’am, he’s got eyes.  I tell you, Miss Scudder, these men, the best of ’em, feel what’s what, though they don’t know much.  I saw the Doctor look at Mary that night I dressed her for the wedding-party.  I tell you he’d like to have his wife look pretty well, and he’ll get up some blessed text or other about it, just as he did that night about being brought unto the king in raiment of needle-work.  That is an encouraging thought to us sewing-women.

“But this thing was spoken of after the meeting.  Miss Twitchel and Miss Jones were talking about it; and they all say that there would be the best setting-out got for her that was ever seen in Newport, if it should happen.  Why, there’s reason in it.  She ought to have at least two real good India silks that will stand alone,—­and you’ll see she’ll have ’em, too; you let me alone for that; and I was thinking, as I lay awake last night, of a new way of making up, that you will say is just the sweetest that ever you did see.  And Miss Jones was saying that she hoped there wouldn’t anything happen without her knowing it, because her husband’s sister in Philadelphia has sent her a new receipt for cake, and she has tried it and it came out beautifully, and she says she’ll send some in.”

All the time that this stream was flowing, Mrs. Scudder stood with the properly reserved air of a discreet matron, who leaves all such matters to Providence, and is not supposed unduly to anticipate the future; and, in reply, she warmly pressed Miss Prissy’s hand, and remarked, that no one could tell what a day might bring forth,—­and other general observations on the uncertainty of mortal prospects, which form a becoming shield when people do not wish to say more exactly what they are thinking of.

[To be continued.]