While they stood there, Mr. Chamberlayne came down the staircase, wiping
his eyes, which were very red, on his white silk handkerchief.
"She bears it beautifully, just as we might have expected," he said "I
have seldom witnessed such fortitude, such saintly resignation to what
she feels to be the will of God."
Molly's eyes left his face and turned to the purple and gold of the
meadows, where webs of silver thistledown were floating over the
path she had trodden only a few hours ago. Nothing had changed in the
landscape--the same fugitive bloom was on the fields, the same shadows
were on the hillside, the same amber light was on the turnpike. She
thought of many things in that instant, but beneath them all, like
an undercurrent, ran the knowledge that Mrs. Gay was "bearing it
beautifully" behind her closed shutters. When her mind went back to the
past, she remembered the elder Jonathan, who had perished in the fine
silken mesh of the influence he was powerless to break. After this came
the memory of the day when Janet Merryweather had flung herself on the
mercy of the gentle heart, and had found it iron.
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