‘I don’t understand you,’ she said.  ’Either you have made some great mistake, or I don’t quite understand you.’

’No, mother, I have made no mistake.  Papa has written to the bishop, saying that he has such doubts that he cannot conscientiously remain a priest of the Church of England, and that he must give up Helstone.  He has also consulted Mr. Bell—­Frederick’s godfather, you know, mamma; and it is arranged that we go to live in Milton-Northern.’  Mrs. Hale looked up in Margaret’s face all the time she was speaking these words:  the shadow on her countenance told that she, at least, believed in the truth of what she said.

‘I don’t think it can be true,’ said Mrs. Hale, at length.  ’He would surely have told me before it came to this.’

It came strongly upon Margaret’s mind that her mother ought to have been told:  that whatever her faults of discontent and repining might have been, it was an error in her father to have left her to learn his change of opinion, and his approaching change of life, from her better-informed child.  Margaret sat down by her mother, and took her unresisting head on her breast, bending her own soft cheeks down caressingly to touch her face.

’Dear, darling mamma! we were so afraid of giving you pain.  Papa felt so acutely—­you know you are not strong, and there must have been such terrible suspense to go through.’

‘When did he tell you, Margaret?’

‘Yesterday, only yesterday,’ replied Margaret, detecting the jealousy which prompted the inquiry.  ’Poor papa!’—­trying to divert her mother’s thoughts into compassionate sympathy for all her father had gone through.  Mrs. Hale raised her head.

‘What does he mean by having doubts?’ she asked.  ’Surely, he does not mean that he thinks differently—­that he knows better than the Church.’  Margaret shook her head, and the tears came into her eyes, as her mother touched the bare nerve of her own regret.

‘Can’t the bishop set him right?’ asked Mrs. Hale, half impatiently.

‘I’m afraid not,’ said Margaret.  ’But I did not ask.  I could not bear to hear what he might answer.  It is all settled at any rate.  He is going to leave Helstone in a fortnight.  I am not sure if he did not say he had sent in his deed of resignation.’

‘In a fortnight!’ exclaimed Mrs. Hale, ’I do think this is very strange—­not at all right.  I call it very unfeeling,’ said she, beginning to take relief in tears.  ’He has doubts, you say, and gives up his living, and all without consulting me.  I dare say, if he had told me his doubts at the first I could have nipped them in the bud.’

Mistaken as Margaret felt her father’s conduct to have been, she could not bear to hear it blamed by her mother.  She knew that his very reserve had originated in a tenderness for her, which might be cowardly, but was not unfeeling.

’I almost hoped you might have been glad to leave Helstone, mamma,’ said she, after a pause.  ’You have never been well in this air, you know.’