Could it have been this vision that soothed her, so that she unclasped her hands and lifted her bowed head as if she had heard a voice whispering to her from that unknown world where she felt there was a spirit watching over her?  At any rate, her face was never more serene than when she went to meeting with the two maiden ladies on the following day, Sunday, and heard the Rev. Mr. Stoker preach a sermon from Luke vii. 48, which made both the women shed tears, but especially so excited Miss Cynthia that she was in a kind of half-hysteric condition all the rest of the day.

After that Myrtle was quieter and more docile than ever before.  Could it be, Miss Silence thought, that the Rev. Mr. Stoker’s sermon had touched her hard heart?  However that was, she did not once wear the stormy look with which she had often met the complaining remonstrances Miss Silence constantly directed against all the spontaneous movements of the youthful and naturally vivacious subject of her discipline.

June is an uncertain month, as everybody knows, and there were frosts in many parts of New England in the June of 1859.  But there were also beautiful days and nights, and the sun was warm enough to be fast ripening the strawberries,—­also certain plans which had been in flower some little time.  Some preparations had been going on in a quiet way, so that at the right moment a decisive movement could be made.  Myrtle knew how to use her needle, and always had a dexterous way of shaping any article of dress or ornament,—­a natural gift not very rare, but sometimes very needful, as it was now.

On the morning of the 15th of June she was wandering by the shores of the river, some distance above The Poplars, when a boat came drifting along by her, evidently broken loose from its fastenings farther up the stream.  It was common for such waifs to show themselves after heavy rains had swollen the river.  They might have run the gauntlet of nobody could tell how many farms, and perhaps passed by half a dozen towns and villages in the night, so that, if of common, cheap make, they were retained without scruple, by any who might find them, until the owner called for them, if he cared to take the trouble.

Myrtle took a knife from her pocket, cut down a long, slender sapling, and coaxed the boat to the side of the bank.  A pair of old oars lay in the bottom of the boat; she took one of these and paddled it into a little cove, where it could lie hid among the thick alders.  Then she went home and busied herself about various little matters more interesting to her than to us.

She was never more amiable and gracious than on this day.  But she looked often at the clock, as they remembered afterwards, and studied over a copy of the Farmer’s Almanac which was lying in the kitchen, with a somewhat singular interest.  The days were nearly at their longest, the weather was mild, the night promised to be clear and bright.