Away she bustled, and was over in her daughter’s cottage in a moment. There, to her extreme delight, she found that Grace and Glory had just arrived and was talking to Mercy. They broke off immediately, however, and looked in astonishment at Mrs. Valiant, who stood before them, her cheeks still wet with tears and her face one radiant smile of joy. “Oh, Grace and Glory,” she exclaimed, “how glad I am to find you here too! It is just right! Your aunt Dismal is over in my cottage, and you must both come and have a cup of tea with us.”

“Aunt Dismal!” they both exclaimed together. “Oh, tell us what has happened! She has not been outside her cottage for months.”

“Come and see!” cried Mrs. Valiant happily, “Just see what the Shepherd has done for her! You go across now, both of you, and make the tea, Mercy dear. I am just going out into the road to see whether there is anyone else about who can share our joy!”

Then out she went, and sure enough whom should she see but Mrs. Dismal’s daughter, Gloomy, hesitating at the gate. “Mrs. Valiant,” said Gloomy awkwardly (in the days when she was first married to Lord Fearing’s son she had not deigned to know her mother’s old friend, Mrs. Valiant, the Shepherdess)—“Mrs. Valiant, have you seen my mother anywhere? I think she was planning to visit you.”

Mrs. Valiant took her warmly by the arm as though she were a close friend—as though she had never been snubbed and coldly ignored by the young woman now standing shamefacedly before her—and she exclaimed heartily: “Yes, indeed, she is now sitting in the porch of my cottage, and we are just going to have a cup of tea. Come and join us, my dear.”

Gloomy drew back a little with a slight flush on her cheeks. After snubbing and patronizing people all her life, until the tables were turned in such a disastrous fashion, she now felt miserable and ashamed in the presence of all those whom she had so treated.

Without appearing to notice this, Mrs. Valiant went on cheerfully: “Mercy and your cousin, Grace and Glory, are there already. Do come, dear Gloomy, it will make us all so happy.”

“Is Grace and Glory there too?” asked Gloomy in quite another tone of voice. “Thank you, Mrs. Valiant, I shall be glad to come.”

So over to the cottage they went, and what a scene it was! There in the shady, honeysuckle-covered porch was the table spread with a white cloth, and upon it the blue and white cups and saucers, the old brown teapot, and one of Mrs. Valiant’s famous cakes, so crisp and delicious smelling that it made one’s mouth water.