Reverend MacGill, the new minister, at first disappointed her. He
was tall and gaunt; and his face was long and gaunt, lighted with
deep-set, smouldering, dark eyes and topped with an unruly thatch of
dark hair. Missy thought him terribly ugly until he smiled, and then
she wasn't quite so sure. As the sermon went on and his harsh but
flexible voice mounted, now and then, to an impassioned height, she
would feel herself mounting with it; then when it fell again to
calmness, she would feel herself falling, too. She understood why
grandma called him "inspired." And once when his smile, on one of
its sudden flashes from out that dark gauntness of his face, seemed
aimed directly at her she felt a quick, responsive, electric thrill.
The Methodist girls were right--he was fascinating.

She didn't wait until after the service to express her approbation
to Tess--anyway, to a fifteen-year-old surreptitiousness seems to
add zest to any communication. She tore a corner from the hymnal
fly-leaf and scribbled her verdict while the elder O'Neills and most
of the old people were kneeling in prayer. Assuring herself that all
nearby heads to be dreaded were reverentially bent, she passed the
missive. As she did so she chanced to glance up toward the minister.

Oh, dear heaven! He was looking straight down at her. He had seen
her--the O'Neill pew was only three rows back. It was too awful.
What would he think of her? An agony of embarrassment and shame
swept over her.

And then--could she believe her eyes?--right in the midst of his
prayer, his harshly melodious voice rising and falling with never a
break--the Reverend MacGill smiled. Smiled straight at her--there
could be no mistake. And a knowing, sympathetic, understanding kind