And in the weakness consequent on protracted suffering, she had
begun to fancy that the loss of Phemy was a punishment upon them
for deserting the conventicle. Also the schoolmaster was under an
interdict, and that looked like a judgment too! She must find some
prop for the faith that was now shaking like a reed in the wind.
So to the Baillies' Barn she had gone.
The tempest which had convulsed Mrs Findlay's atmosphere, had
swept its vapours with it as it passed away; and when she entered
the cavern, it was with an unwonted inclination to be friendly all
round. As fate would have it, she unwittingly took her place by
Mrs Mair, whom she had not seen since she gave Lizzy shelter. When
she discovered who her neighbour was, she started away, and stared;
but she had had enough of quarrelling for the evening, and besides
had not had time to bar her door against the angel Pity, who suddenly
stepped across the threshhold of her heart with the sight of Mrs
Mair's pale thin cheeks and tear reddened eyes. As suddenly, however,
an indwelling demon of her own house, whose name was Envy, arose
from the ashes of her hearth to meet the white robed visitant:
Phemy, poor little harmless thing, was safe enough! who would harm
a hair of her? but Lizzy! And this woman had taken in the fugitive
from honest chastisement! She would yet have sought another seat
but the congregation rose to sing; and her neighbour's offer of
the use in common of her psalm book, was enough to quiet for the
moment the gaseous brain of the turbulent woman.
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