CHAPTER XXXV.
THE MUSICIAN.
One evening, soon after the baby's arrival, as Mary sat with him in her lap, the sweet tones they had heard twice before came creeping into her ears so gently that she seemed to be aware of their presence only after they had been for some time coming and going: she laid the baby down, and, stealing from the room, listened on the landing.

Certainly the sounds were born in the house, but whether they came from below or above she could not tell.

Going first down the stair, and then up, she soon satisfied herself that they came from above, and thereupon ventured a little farther up the stair.
She had already been to see the dressmaker, whom she had come to know through the making of Hesper's twilight robe of cloud, had found her far from well, and had done what she could for her.

But she was in no want, and of more than ordinary independence--a Yorkshire woman, about forty years of age, delicate, but of great patience and courage; a plain, fair, freckled woman, with a belief in religion rather than in God.

Very strict, therefore, in her observances, she thought a great deal more of the Sabbath than of man, a great deal more of the Bible than of the truth, and ten times more of her creed than of the will of God; and, had she heard any one utter such words as I have just written, would have said he was an atheist.