Mr. Satterlee looked at her, and then he went quietly across the room and kissed her.  But then Mr. Satterlee was the minister.  Cynthia thought his hair a little thinner and the lines in his face a little deeper.  And Mr. Satterlee thought perhaps he was the only one of the visitors who guessed why she had come back.  He laid his thin hand on her head, as though in benediction, and sat down beside her.

“And how is the learning, Cynthia?” he asked.

Now, indeed, they were going to hear something at last.  An intuition impelled Cynthia to take advantage of that opportunity.

“The learning has become so great, Mr. Satterlee,” she said, “that I have come back to try to make some use of it.  It shall be wasted no more.”

She did not dare to look at Jethro, but she was aware that he had sat down abruptly.  What sacrifice will not a good woman make to ease the burden of those whom she loves!  And Jethro’s burden would be heavy enough.  Such a woman will speak almost gayly, though her heart be heavy.  But Cynthia’s was lighter now than it had been.

“I was always sure you would not waste your learning, Cynthia,” said Mr. Satterlee, gravely; “that you would make the most of the advantages God has given you.”

“I am going to try, Mr. Satterlee.  I cannot be content in idleness.  I was wasting time in Boston, and I—­I was not happy so far away from you all—­from Uncle Jethro.  Mr. Satterlee, I am going to teach school.  I have always wanted to, and now I have made up my mind to do it.”

This was Jethro’s punishment.  But had she not lightened it for him a little by choosing this way of telling him that she could not eat his bread or partake of his bounty?  Though by reason of that bounty she was what she was, she could not live and thrive on it longer, coming as it did from such a source.  Mr. Satterlee might perhaps surmise the truth, but the town and village would think her ambition a very natural one, certainly no better time could have been chosen to announce it.

“To teach school.”  She was sure now that Mr. Satterlee knew and approved, and perceived something, at least, of her little ruse.  He was a man whose talents fitted him for a larger flock than he had at Coniston, but he possessed neither the graces demanded of city ministers nor the power of pushing himself.  Never was a more retiring man.  The years she had spent in his study had not gone for nothing, for he who has cherished the bud can predict what the flower will be, and Mr. Satterlee knew her spiritually better than any one else in Coniston.  He had heard of her return, and had walked over to the tannery house, full of fears, the remembrance of those expressions of simple faith in Jethro coming back to his mind.  Had the revelation which he had so long expected come at last? and how had she taken it? would it embitter her?  The good man believed that it would not, and now he saw that it had not, and rejoiced accordingly.