She accepted the
kindness, and, the singing over, did not refuse to look on the same
holy page with her daughter's friend, while the ploughman read,
with fitting simplicity, the parable of the Prodigal Son. It touched
something in both, but a different something in each. Strange to
say, neither applied it to her own case, but each to her neighbour's.
As the reader uttered the words "was lost and is found" and ceased,
each turned to the other with a whisper. Mrs Mair persisted in
hers; and the other, which was odd enough, yielded and listened.
"Wad the tale haud wi' lassies as weel 's laddies, Mistress Findlay,
div ye think?" said Mrs Mair.
"Ow, surely!" was the response; "it maun du that. There no respec'
o' persons wi' him. There 's no a doobt but yer Phemy 'ill come
hame to ye safe an' soon'."
"I was thinkin' aboot Lizzy," said the other, a little astonished;
and then the prayer began, and they had to be silent.
The sermon of the ploughman was both dull and sensible,--an
excellent variety where few of the sermons were either; but it made
little impression on Mrs Findlay or Mrs Mair.
As they left the cave together in the crowd of issuing worshippers,
Mrs Mair whispered again:
"I wad invete ye ower, but ye wad be wantin' Lizzy hame, an' I can
ill spare the comfort o' her the noo," she said, with the cunning
of a dove.
"An' what comes o' me?" rejoined Mrs Findlay, her claws out in a
moment where her personal consequence was touched.
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