they would.  I should like to get a nearer view of that trimming around her sack; it is lovely whatever it is.—­’And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.’” Now it was doubtful if it had once occurred to Ester who this glorious “Word” was, or that He had aught to do with her.  Certainly the wonderful and gracious truths embodied in these precious verses, truths which had to do with every hour of her life, had not this evening so much as made an entrance into her busy brain; and yet she actually thought herself in the way of getting rid of the troublesome thoughts that had haunted her the days just past.  The verses were being read aloud, the thoughts about the troublesome hair and the trimmings on Miss Hastings’ sack were suffered to remain thoughts, not to put into words—­had they been perhaps even Ester would have noticed the glaring incongruity.  As it was she continued her two occupations, reading the verses, thinking the thoughts, until at last she came to a sudden pause, and silence reigned in the room for several minutes; then there flushed over Ester’s face a sudden glow, as she realized that she sat, Bible in hand, one corner of the solemnly-worded card marking the verse at which she had paused, and that verse was:  “He came unto his own, and his own received him not.”  And she realized that her thoughts during the silence had been:  “Suppose Miss Hastings should call and should inquire for her, and she should go with Aunt Helen to return the call, should she wear mother’s black lace shawl with her blue silk dress, or simply the little ruffled cape which matched the dress!  She read that last verse over again, with an uncomfortable consciousness that she was not getting on very well; but try as she would, Ester’s thoughts seemed resolved not to stay with that first chapter of John—­they roved all over New York, visited all the places that she had seen, and a great many that she wanted to see, and that seemed beyond her grasp, going on meantime with the verses, and keeping up a disagreeable undercurrent of disgust.  Over those same restless thoughts there came a tap at the door, and Maggie’s voice outside.

“Miss Ried, Miss Abbie sent me to say that there was company waiting to see you, and if you please would you come down as soon as you could?”

Ester sprang up.  “Very well,” she responded to Maggie.  “I’ll be down immediately.”

Then she waited to shut the card into her Bible to keep the place, took a parting peep in the mirror to see that the brown hair and blue ribbon were in order, wondered if it were really the Hastings who called on her, unlocked her door, and made a rapid passage down the stairs—­most unpleasantly conscious, however, at that very moment that her intentions of setting herself right had not been carried out, and also that so far as she had gone it had been a failure.  Truly, after the lapse of so many years, the light was still shining in darkness.