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Will you go?" "O yes, indeed! if you will let me. And Rosy?" "We will go nowhere without Rosy." Diana made her cake like one in a dream. The journey to Mainbridge, the manufacturing town in question, took place within a few days. With eager cordiality the minister and his family were welcomed in the house of one of the chief men of the church and of the place, and made very much at home.
Not to her mother Not to any one, till the person most concerned knew the truth; and most certainly after that not to any one else. Evan had been told; there had been a reason; she was glad she had told him. "What do you suppose I'd do in Mainbridge?" Mrs. Starling went on. "There is plenty to do, mother. It is because there is so much to do, that we are going." "Dressing and giving parties.
For the present Diana had to attend to her mother, whose conversation was anything but agreeable after she learned that her son-in-law had accepted the call to Mainbridge. "Ministers are made of stuff very like common people," she declared. "Every one goes where he can get the most." "You know Mr. Masters has plenty already, mother; plenty of his own."
"The ways o' the world," she muttered scornfully, "are too queer for anything!" But Diana let the imputation lie. They went to Mainbridge. Not Mrs. Starling, but the others. And you may think of them as happy, with both hands full of work. They live in a house just a little bit out of the town, where there is plenty of ground for gardens, and the air is not poisoned with smoke or vapour.
"People at least would not be shocked if you told them here what Christian living is. And there are some who know it by experience." "No doubt, so there are in the Mainbridge church, though it may be we shall find them most among the poor people." "But what is it you want me to do, Basil?" "Show them what a life lived for Christ is.
"They would be very much astonished to hear you say so." "But is it not true?" "You would find every wealthy community more or less like Mainbridge." "Would I? That does not alter the case, Basil." "No. Do you think things are different here in Pleasant Valley?" Diana pondered. "I think they do not seem the same," she said.
"Do you know, Basil, the millowners in Mainbridge seemed to me to want something done for them, quite as much as the millworkers?" "I make the charge of that over to you." "Me!" said Diana. "Why not?" "What do you want me to do for them?" "What do you think they need?" "Basil, they do not seem to me to have the least idea not an idea of what true religion is."
"So shall I. It commonized the whole thing." There was nothing common left, as every one instantly recognised who saw Diana that evening. A presence of such dignified grace, a face of such lofty and yet innocent beauty, so sweet a movement and manner, nobody there knew anything like it in Mainbridge.
They hoped she liked Mainbridge; they hoped she was coming to live among them; Mr. Masters was coming to the church, wasn't he? and how did he like the looks of the place? "You see the best part of the church here to-night," remarked one stout elderly lady in a black silk and with flowers in her cap; a very well-to-do, puffy old lady; "you see just the best of them, and all the best!"
"What do you call the best part of a church?" Diana asked, looking round the room. "Well, you see them before you. There is Mr. Waters standing by the piano he's the wealthiest man in Mainbridge; a very wealthy man. The one with his head a little bald, speaking just now to Mrs. Brandt, is one of our elders; he's pretty comfortable too; a beautiful place he has have you seen it? No?
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