But the only answer she received was, “You have chosen and gone your own way, Much-Afraid, and it is not my way. And I do not hesitate to tell you that even though misfortune has overtaken me, while good fortune has smiled upon you, I do not at all desire to be pitied and patronized by you. Smitten I may be, and left desolate and friendless, but patronized I will not be. You need not trouble yourself to visit here again.”

Grace and Glory left the cottage and walked sadly away, wondering if anything could have been more unlike her radiant, loving dreams of helping her relatives than the actual reality. For a few moments she felt almost overwhelmed.

When, however, she reached the cottage where she and Mercy had lived together, and found her friend and Mrs. Valiant bustling around full of cheerful preparations for the party, to which the Chief Shepherd himself had been invited, and when she saw Joy and Peace (whom she had left at the cottage, telling herself that if she were accompanied by her two handmaidens when she visited her miserable aunt, that she might appear to be showing off)—when she met their loving greeting, she did feel a balm applied to her heart. And she said to herself, “Next time I go to visit Aunt Dismal, I shall take Joy and Peace with me.”

There was just time before the guests arrived for bustling Mrs. Valiant to take her aside for a moment and whisper, “Well, my dear, how did you get on and what sort of reception did you receive from that poor creature, Dismal?”

“She told me never to visit her again,” answered Grace and Glory sorrowfully, “and I am afraid she really meant it.”

“You would never believe how many times she has said exactly the same thing to me!” replied Mrs. Valiant cheerily, “but she would be quick enough to object if I took her at her word. Never pay any attention to anything poor Dismal says, my dear. She is starved for love and doesn’t know it. Just go on loving; it always wins in the end.”

Mrs. Valiant, as you may easily guess without being told, was another who had been with the Shepherd to the High Places, and wore in her heart the flowering plant of love which made her a citizen of that kingdom.

Then they heard the sound of footsteps outside, and of happy, laughing voices, and the next moment the Chief Shepherd himself, surrounded by his friends, entered the cottage, and the feast began. The kettle sang on the hearth, the guests talked and laughed merrily together, the yellow cat lay purring on the Chief Shepherd’s knees, and the black-and-white one curled up on the lap of Grace and Glory. The sheep dogs lay at the door, wagging their tails, and Mrs. Valiant busied herself filling and refilling the cups with tea, and all in the cottage was the most mirthful and contented spot in the whole village—just as though a little bit of the Kingdom of Love had been transplanted down to the Valley. Which of course was the case.