 Chapter 9 He that Wineth souls is wise. They were walking home together in the moonlight, Jenny Adams and Jim Forbes. Very bright and pretty looked Jenny, and very happy she was. It was altogether a pleasant thing to be coming home from a lecture, being very carefully escorted by a nice-looking young man, and being conscious that her new hat, with its blue feather, was very becoming. Meantime her companion was unusually silent and thoughtful. The truth was he had been trying ever since they started from the hall to frame a sentence into words that suited him. He had thought of it much of the time during the lecture. A good lecture it was, too, one that at another time would have absorbed the entire attention of the young man. It was an unusual month for lectures, glowing June, but Mr. Tresivant's had been the closing one of a spring course, gotten up by the benevolently inclined for the special benefit of the large class of working people in Newton, who were rather more at leisure during the months of March and April than at any other season. It was called the People's Course, had been very popular, very well attended, and now somewhat later in the season than had been at first intended, Mr. Tresivant closed the series with a lecture that was pronounced the best one of the course. But Mr. Forbes had given somewhat divided attention to it throughout, his heart being filled with another matter, and now having tried in vain to suit himself as to the manner in which he should speak, and feeling keenly how every moment lessened the distance toward Jenny's home, he suddenly brought before her this absorbing thought of his heart in very simple, straightforward language. Jenny, I do wish you were a Christian. The valuable flow of words with which Jenny had been sweetening his silence suddenly ceased. She was very much astonished. This was not at all the manner of speech to which pretty Jenny was accustomed when she walked home in the moonlight with some fortunate young man from the factory. But then Mr. Forbes was the foreman, and very superior to all her other acquaintances. She felt this to the very tips of her fingers. Until she did not know how to answer him, I do not know that she had ever given herself up to ten minutes serious thought on the subject in question. So while she was very anxious to answer the remark in a becoming and proper manner, she hadn't the least idea what sort of an answer it should be. Presently she said, meekly enough, I suppose I should be a good deal better company for people like you, Mr. Forbes, than I am now if I knew anything about such things. It isn't that, and poor Jim, as he spoke eagerly, was painfully conscious that this pretty little creature was rapidly becoming better company than he found anywhere else in the world. It isn't that, but you see, it is such a blessed thing to be, and you would be so much happier and could do so much good. Something of the tremulous earnestness that was in his heart showed itself in his voice, and Jenny felt it. Straightway it roused within her that spirit of impishness that seems to hide in the heart of every pretty girl of eighteen or so, and she answered, in tones that a butterfly might have used for all the feeling that was in them, why I'm happy enough, I don't know as I am ever unhappy unless I want to go to a concert or something and can't. And as for doing good, don't you think that is awful stupid work, Mr. Forbes? Poor Jim, how could he answer her, how could he make her understand anything about it? Would you ever feel the need of having some great, good, powerful friend, who was strong enough to help you always out of trouble, you know, or danger, and who was ready and willing to help you always? He said, speaking rapidly and with great earnestness, going back in thought to his own lonely, miserable life, and the awful need that had been his, and the glorious remedy he had found. Perverse Jenny had felt in a much fainter degree something of this feeling, felt it as every human heart does, but let no one imagine that she was going to reveal such a desire to Mr. Forbes. That would not have been in accordance with the same deceitful human heart. She answered lightly, Why, I've got friends, you know, father is just as good as he can be, and he is always doing something for us children. And as for mother, why, there's nothing in this world that she ain't ready and willing to do for every one of us. And then they had turned to the corner and were fairly at the steps of Mr. Adam's house. The golden opportunity was gone, and the humble, eager worker for the master almost in despair. Won't you think about it, he gasped, as she tripped up the steps? Think about what, she asked, with her hand on the doorknob, and turning toward him with a bright, laughing face, looking like a witch in the moonlight. She would not understand. How could he explain it to her? There was no time, anyway. While being a Christian, he said hurriedly, as the doorknob turned in her hand. I don't know how, she answered, partly in wickedness, and partly in honest truthfulness. But she finished the sentence with a low, rollicking laugh, and a, good night, Mr. Forbes. Then the door opened and closed, and his vision had vanished. Very heavy sighs he drew as he walked slowly down the street alone. Once he put up his hand and brushed away a manly tear. He had thought so much about this, had prayed so much over it, and her manner of receiving it had been so great a disappointment to him. I don't know how, he said, in deep and pitiful humility. I don't know how to speak to a bright, smart little body like her. I don't know how to make religion attractive to her. I'm nothing but a poor stick, anyhow. He could not know that Jenny Adams went straight up the narrow staircase to her room, not waiting to give her usual gleeful account of the evening's pleasure to her mother, that the laugh vanished entirely from her face, that she unfastened the dainty knot of blue ribbon at her throat without so much as a peep into her ten-inch looking-glass to see what possible effect its becomingness might have had on her companion, that she said aloud, he's real good, anyhow, the best man that ever lived, that she sat down presently when her light was out before the open window, and leaned her brown head on the window-seat and cried outright, that finally she knelt reverently before that window and said, our father who art in heaven threw to the amen a thing that she had not done before since she was a little girl. All this he could not know. Neither could she know that he went home and spent hours on his knees that night praying for her. But the father in heaven, looking lovingly watchfully down on his creatures, knew all about them both. He was a thought-born of this wrestling prayer that brought him next evening to the door of Mrs. Sayle's house. Doomed to disappointment he felt himself, however, for Miss Bronson, of whom he was in search, was not at home. After several eager questions as to her whereabouts and when she was expected, he was about turning disconsolidately away when the lady of the house came out to greet him. Very frank and hearty was her invitation to him to come in. Come, she said genially, as he hesitated, I want to see you. I haven't had a nice talk with you since you came. And moved by a sudden impulse, he followed her into the brightly lighted room. A small person, daintily robed in white, was trotting busily from chair to sofa, bestowing treasures here and there. A rare and wonderful evening was it to baby Essie. Mama alone in the sitting-room, no papa to claim her attention, the nurse gone out for the evening and her small self-raining queen. She peeped at the newcomer shyly between the tiny fingers that were put up to shield her from view, then advanced cautiously toward his outstretched hand, finally surrendered entirely, allowing her rosebud mouth to be kissed, and putting her bit of a velvet hand into Jim Ford's great rough one. That's an unusual mark of confidence, Mrs. Sayle's explained. She is very sparing of her kisses and not particularly fond of shaking hands. How are you getting on, Mr. Forbes? You find plenty of opportunity for work at the mills, I suppose. Yes, ma'am," Jim said. The busy season was coming on now, and there would be more to do than usual. Oh, yes, but I mean our kind of work, that which you and I are both trying to do for Jesus. There is always so much of that kind to do, and you have a special chance, you see, you and Mr. Sayle's. The Jim's eyes suddenly filled, and the form of Baby Essie grew dim before him. It was so unusual for anyone to speak to him in this way of the work to be done for Jesus, speaking as if interested in the work living for the same object. He tried to answer her to show how grateful he was for this sort of help, but his voice choked and refused to do his bidding. She was answered, though. A great tear fell on Baby Essie's wee hand, and the mother, seeing it, knew that her visitor's heart was full. Was it chance or a watching spirit's influence that led her thoughts just then toward Jenny Adams? She spoke eagerly. Do you know, Mr. Forbes, I am very much interested in a new scholar who only came to my class last sabbath. Jenny Adams, you know her, I think. Did you know she is in my class? I, he knew it very well indeed. A dozen times during the session of the school had his eyes and his wits wandered over to that bright, rosy-cheeked maiden, acting so dimmier and looking so pretty in the corner of Mrs. Sayles' class. I saw her there, he managed to stammer out at last. I was so glad to have her come, Mrs. Sayles said with enthusiasm. I have been after that young lady for some time. She seemed very shy of me, but I think we shall get acquainted now. Mr. Forbes had planned to tell Miss Bronson all about Jenny and his longings for her. But the words were gone, not a sentence that he had intended to say came to his aid. But the one earnest, all-absorbing desire of his heart was present still and broke forth in simple language. I want so much to have her a Christian. Yes, Mrs. Sayles said, with ready sympathy. Do you think she is particularly interested, Mr. Forbes? No, Mr. Forbes answered slowly, with a peculiar lumpiness throat as he remembered how little interest Jenny had exhibited. No, I can't say as I think she is. But then—but then we wish her to be, and to wait until people are interested before we begin to pray and work for them is not the way to save the world, is it? Have you had any personal conversation with her? I tried to talk to her a little, said poor Jim, in great humility. But you see, I don't know how to do it, and I made a great muddle. I think maybe I did more harm than good. It is very natural for us to think that, even after we have done the best that we can, Mrs. Sayles said gently, feeling an immense respect for her husband's foreman. And if we walked in our own strength, I suppose we should have little else than a long line of mistakes to show. But the master, you know, can use even our blunders for his glory. But meantime, what can we do for Jenny? I want to get better acquainted with her. How would it do for me to invite her to tea, do you think, say on Saturday? Baby Essie and I could have a pleasant afternoon with her. And couldn't you call in the evening and see that she reached home safely? Did that fair little woman with the soft blue eyes and earnest face have any sort of idea of the paradise that she was opening to the young man before her? As for him, words went from him again. He could only bow and try to stammer out an appreciation of her goodness which proved unintelligible so far as words were concerned, but which, nevertheless, seemed to be entirely satisfactory to Mrs. Wales. End of Chapter 9, Recording by Tricia G. CHAPTER 10 In the mouth of the foolish is a rod of pride, but the lips of the wise shall preserve them. Great was the flutter into which the Adams family were thrown when, on one never-to-be-forgotten evening, Hannah in need of tire presented herself with Mrs. Sales' compliments and would Miss Jenny come and take tea with her the next afternoon at six o'clock. Jenny's pink cheeks flushed into Scarlett, and she turned to her mother in a bewilderment of delight. Mother, whatever shall I say? Say? Why, whatever you're a mind-to-child," answered Mrs. Adams, trying hard not to look radiant with surprise delight. When I was a young thing like you, if I'd got invited to one of the handsomest houses in town, I'd have known what to say dreadful quick. But there's the factory, you know, Jenny said in troubled tone. I don't get home from there till quite a while after six. It was now Mr. Adams' turn to join the conclave. Never mind the factory, he said heartily. It's a pity you shouldn't have an afternoon now and then, as well as the best of them. Of course Mr. Sales will let you off when it's his lady who sends for you. I'll see him myself about it, and my word for it. You needn't go to the factory tomorrow afternoon at all. Well then, Jenny said, with her merry little laugh, you tell her, Hannah, that I'll be glad to come. And the moment Hannah departed, eager preparations commenced. There's that darn in your white dress, began the mother, that must be fixed. You get it, and I'll darn it right away. I'm more used to that kind of work than you are, and you can finish this shirt as well as not. Jenny brought the dress but looked rueful over it. I don't believe I can go, after all, she said forlornly. This dress is dirtier than I had any notion of. I don't see how I got it so dirty. You don't think it is fit, do you, mother? Not without washing, of course, child, what a giddy thing you are. And it's torn zigzag, of course, whoever saw a straight tear. But I can mend it, and I'll have it done up as fine as a fiddle by the time you get home tomorrow noon. Oh, mother, Jenny said, both charmed and conscious stricken, but you have such an awful lot to do tomorrow. It ain't the first time I've had a lot to do. This mother answered grim satisfaction in her tones as she threaded a cambrick needle and proceeded to do wonders with the zigzag tear. I'll have it ready, no danger of that. When I set out to do a thing, I always get it done. It takes your mother for that kind of work, or most any other, said the commonplace ignorant husband of twenty years standing, thereby bringing a flush to the worn and faded cheek of the hard-working wife. A word of commendation was still, after these twenty years of experience, the nicest thing the world had for her. Meantime Mr. Adams had deserted his paper and was fumbling over an old account book, adding up certain short columns of figures in an audible whisper, and presently he counted out seven very ragged-looking ten-cent pieces and handed them with a gratified smile to Jenny. There, he said triumphantly, I can spare that, and if you want a new ribbon, maybe there's enough. Anyhow, that's the best I can do. Oh, father! And the shirt over which that young lady was bending slid to the floor, and she was at his side in an instant. I can do without a new ribbon, I can truly, and I didn't expect a cent of money. A whole afternoon away from the factory is more than I expected, and I can do nicely without money. Take it, take it, said the gratified father, a gleam of satisfaction in his eyes. It was very nice to have his little sacrifice so warmly appreciated and so lovingly received. Some girls would have turned up their noses at it because it isn't more, he said to himself, but our Jenny isn't of that sort. So this family made their loving little sacrifices of labor and time and money, and felt grateful to the very tips of their fingers to Mrs. Sales for her invitation. That lady, on her part, was very busy making arrangements for the entertainment of her guest. It chanced that on the particular afternoon in question Mr. Trecevant was to be absent attending a minister's meeting. The look of relief that overspread Mrs. Sales' face when she first heard of this arrangement, and the little sigh in which she indulged, were too apparent to escape Del's notice, and her hostess, mortified at herself for harboring such feelings, eagerly explained, You see, he is accustomed to such a different class of people. He would not know just what to say to her, and I'm afraid it might be embarrassing to both of them. No, Del said mischievously, calling to mind the class of society that loosed him necessarily furnished the fastidious gentleman. No, of course he is not accustomed to that class of people, and of course you are, have spent your entire life among them. Oh, Abby, aren't you a bit of a hypocrite? I don't mean to be, Abby answered meekly enough, but Del, don't you think it is easier for ladies to accommodate themselves to circumstances than it is for gentlemen? Undoubtedly, Del said, with the gravity of a judge, just try Mrs. Trecevant's powers of accommodation and see how beautifully she will prove your theory. Whereupon Mrs. Sales gathered her sewing materials about her, and merely saying in her usual gentle tone, when you get rid of this mood-dell and are ready to help me, come upstairs, immediately left the room. On her way upstairs she paused to think over this new idea. Mrs. Trecevant, just how would it suit Mrs. Trecevant's fancy to treat Jenny Adams? And would it be best to tell her something about the expected guest, or leave her to be received as Mrs. Trecevant's impulse should dictate? That lady's impulses were so variable that it did not seem safe to trust to them, and the result of this consultation was that she sought the study. Mrs. Trecevant was in her accustomed, curled-lip attitude on the sofa, looking exceedingly sleepy. With a hesitation and embarrassment that she could not overcome, Mrs. Sales made known her errand. Mrs. Trecevant was gracious, expressed languid interest in the girl, and hoped that Mrs. Sales' notice of her would be productive of good. Though I think, she added, by way of encouragement, that class of people, as a general thing, are better aided by being let alone, left in their own sphere, you know, without having high notions put in their heads. But of course you will be careful and judicious in your treatment of her. I suppose she will take her tea with Kate and Hannah. Why, no, said poor Mrs. Sales, with flushing cheeks. I have invited her to spend the afternoon with me. She is a member of our Sabbath school, you know. Well, my dear Mrs. Sales, so is Hannah. You do not invite her to take tea with you. That is different, Mrs. Sales answered, with a little touch of dignity in her tone. Hannah lives in the house and enjoys taking her meals quietly with Kate. She is not degraded or ill-treated in not being invited to sit down with us at table. She has regular duties to perform at that time, which she engaged to do, and for which she receives payment. But this young girl is my guest for the afternoon, and I mean to treat her as such. Mrs. Tresavon shrugged her shoulders and laughed her soft little laugh. You and Miss Bronson are too much for me, she said. You live in the clouds, but a poor little earthworm like me cannot be expected to keep pace with you. You will have to write out my part and let me commit it to memory. What do you want me to do? Nothing, Mrs. Sales said, turning away, unless you like to come down to the parlor and get better acquainted with her. I am not in the least acquainted with her, never spoke to her in my life, and I presume she would be frightened out of her senses if I did. However, perhaps I'll come down if I get my nap out in time. Mrs. Sales found her heart and spirits strangely ruffled by the interview, and felt compelled to flee to her own room and to her sure refuge for strength and comfort. When she came down half an hour afterward, looking as peaceful as the sunshine, she found Jenny Adams established comfortably in the back parlor, looking bewitchingly pretty in her crisp white dress, with a new pink ribbon at her throat, and her eyes dancing with pleasure and expectation. Dell, meantime, the wicked spirit gone out of her, was exerting herself to the utmost to make the young girl feel at home and happy. A white day was that in Jenny Adams's life. Both ladies exerted themselves to the utmost to render the young girl at ease and to entertain her royally. Baby Essie was in a condescending mood, and bestowed shy, sweet kisses with the tip of her soft little tongue, and displayed with astonishing amyability all her pretty baby accomplishments. Dell at the piano gave the young guests such a musical treat as others more favored than she rarely enjoyed. Mrs. Trecevant did not finish her nap in time for a descent to the parlors, and it was not until they were seated at the tea table that she burst upon Jenny's astonished vision in the full glory of a white muslin overdress in a skirt of lavender poplin. Mr. Sales was in full tide of cordial talk with his wife's guest when the interruption occurred, and had tacked enough to continue it as soon as the introductions were over. So it was not for some moments that Mrs. Trecevant had an opportunity to exhibit any special friendliness. In the first lull that came she turned her peculiar blue-black eyes on Jenny, and with that sort of a well-bred stare which seems to penetrate to the very tips of the stockings hidden under your well-buttoned boots, she said, You work in the mill, I believe? Yes, ma'am, Jenny said, coloring to the roots of her brown hair, and spattering the juice of her strawberries right and left in her startled confusion. Up to that time she had succeeded in appearing wonderfully at her ease, but those great searching eyes seemed to exercise a peculiar power over her. I suppose, continued Mrs. Trecevant in smooth flowing words, I suppose it is a very great treat to you to get away from work for an afternoon and have a chance to see your employer's house? Now be it known that there lurked in Jenny Adam's wicked little heart quite as much pride as throbbed beneath the fluted ruffles of her pastor's wife. Moreover she was quick-witted to an unusual degree, and knew when she was being condescended to, and resented such condescension as proudly as though she did not work in a factory. So now she answered in a heat of blushing haughtiness and confusion that, she did not know as it was, she did not object to the factory, she was perfectly willing to work, in fact enjoyed working. Well, Mrs. Trecevant said, she was glad to hear her say so. It showed a very proper spirit, and was certainly commendable. And it is impossible to convey to you any idea of the condescension with which these words were uttered, where Jenny felt as if the cream biscuit were suddenly burning her throat, and it is to be feared that her hostess felt not much better. Mrs. Trecevant, meantime, considering her duty accomplished, turned serenely to Mr. Sales and questioned, how many workgirls do you employ, Mr. Sales? The only redeeming feature of her conduct being that she addressed not another word to Jenny during the remainder of the meal. Yet I protest to you that this little woman did not at this time mean to do any harm. She simply did not know how to be kind and helpful without being insufferably condescending. There are multitudes of women like her who approach those occupying a lower social position than themselves exactly as they would pat the shaggy head of a dog. They are Ponto, good dog, nice old fellow, and then are amazed at their want of success in trying to do good to that demoralized and unregenerate class of creatures who do the work of this world. A most uncomfortable meal it was the rest of the time. The great luscious strawberry that was split in two just at the time that Mrs. Tresavon began to bestow attention on her remained split and uneaten, and Jenny let the cake-basket with its tempting array pass her with a silent shake of the head. Matters were not improved when they adjourned to the parlors. Jenny's happy time had vanished. She was ill at ease, felt out of place, and miserable. Her main desire was to get home. She even meditated making her escape and leaving Mr. Forbes in the lurch. She told herself that she was a fool for coming, that they were all a proud, hateful set. To complicate matters still more, collars began to arrive, and though Mrs. Sales introduced her gently and sweetly as Miss Jenny Adams, one of the members of my Bible class, even her fair face clouded over as the bell announced a fresh arrival, and there seemed no prospect of bridging over the chasm that she saw had been made between her pupil and herself. It was at this point that Del, who had been sitting over by the south window, arose and crossed to Jenny's side. Bending over her chair, she said in low tones, Miss Adams, wouldn't you like to see Mrs. Sales flowers? She has such beauties. The wisdom of the serpent must have been given to Del just then to tempt her to preface her question with Miss Adams. To what girl of seventeen is not that dignified, respectful miss put before her name a sweet and pleasant sound coming from the lips of one whom she considers her superior? Jenny glanced up with a quick, grateful smile. Yes, she said heartily, I should very much. Then let's you and I escape from this crowd and run over and see them. She has a Kayla that is absolutely wonderful. And talking in bright, familiar strain, she won the young girl with her through the back parlor across a little hall into a tiny room alive with perfume and a glow with flowers. And Jenny forgot her wounded pride and her dignity and her sore heartedness and gave genuine little screams of delight over everything for she was a true and loving worshiper of the green and blooming beauties. How they chatted over the lilies and the roses and the great purple and pink and crimson fuchsias who nodded at them from every corner. There were so many new ones to learn the names of and presently Del with lavish hand began to break off sprays of bloom here and there and to say, These are for your mother. Mrs. Sales spoke of intending to send her a bouquet, and now that she is busy with collars we will just make it ourselves. When they had been all around the little room, Del dropped into a low seat in front of the rose stand gathering up her dress to make room for Jenny, as she said, Let us sit down while we arrange this bouquet. Does your mother like Mignanette? Oh, do you see that plant just at your left with peculiar satiny leaves? That is a slip from mine. I brought it to Mrs. Sales. It is a very choice plant. I think a great deal of mine. Mr. Forbes brought it to me from a plant that his cousin got in Scotland. I'll slip mine again when I get home and send it to you if you like. You know Mr. Forbes, do you not? You don't mean the Mr. Forbes that I know, do you? Jenny asked, fleshing redder than the fuchsias she was holding, the one who was foreman in the factory. I mean him, yes. Didn't you know he was a friend of mine? I knew he thought a great deal of you. And I certainly think a great deal of him, Del said gravely, tying a cluster of purple blossoms against the white ones of her bouquet. I have reason to. He was a good friend to me at a time when I sadly needed earthly friends and felt almost deserted. He is a noble young man, Miss Adams, a noble Christian. I knew him before he was a Christian, and I never saw such a change in anyone. There is hardly a person whom I honor and respect more than I do him. What wonderful words were these, coming from the elegant Boston lady, of whose beauty and wealth Jenny had heard so much concerning the foreman at the factory, and her opinion of Mr. Forbes went upward, despite the fact that it needed no elevation. Del's next remark was offered in lower tone and with great gentleness. When you see such a character as his, doesn't it make you want to be a Christian? I don't know, Jenny answered softly, which was only a confused way of saying nothing, for in her heart she did know. Have you thought about this matter, any? The voice lower and gentler than before. Yes, she had thought about it a great deal, more than she had any intention of owning. Thought about it at times very longingly, since that evening walk with Jim Forbes, when he thought, to use his favorite phrase, that he made a muddle. So now she said very softly, almost under her breath, I thought it must be, Del answered her, I have felt such an interest in you, such a desire to see you a Christian, and Mrs. Sayles I know has been feeling the same way. We are both praying for you. Won't you pray for yourself, Miss Adams? And Jenny, with her fingers pressed close over her eyes, so that the hot tears dropping from them might not be seen, said very low, I'll try. Mrs. Sayles sent for them then. After Forbes was waiting, could not spend the evening, and as Jenny Adams said a silent good night to the closing flowers, there was born into her heart a resolve that shall color all her future life. I don't know whether I did any good, or whether, as Jim says, I made a great muddle, Del said, half laughing, half tearful, as she tried to tell something of the talk in the plant room to Abby later in the evening when they were alone. I said very little, you see, but I prayed a great deal. We can leave her with Christ. There is no more blessed way, Abby said, with Serene Brow. At first I was greatly troubled, nothing went as I had planned it should, but presently it occurred to me that her savior knew more about her and coveted her soul more than I did, and I left it with him. For my part, Del said, nothing in my life went as I had planned it should. The Lord has taken great pains to show me that he can do his own work in his own way, and that when I want to help, I must let him lead. CHAPTER XI. See then that ye walks circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise. Mr. Trecevant was in fancy dressing-gown and floured slippers, leaning back in his easy chair, looking, his white thought, the picture of provoking indifference. She was in her curled-up attitude on the couch, both feet under her, her front hair in its after-dinner crimping pins, collar and jewelry laid aside, and a general air of readiness for her after-dinner nap about her. There were, however, two pink spots on her cheeks and the determined glitter in her eyes that ogred ill for her nap, unless she could undergo some calming down process. The rooms are perfectly elegant, she continued after a moment's silence, large and well ventilated and most charmingly furnished. Any better furnished than these, Mr. Trecevant asked, glancing his eyes down the length of the room, and letting it rest gratefully on one and another object of taste and beauty. Oh, differently furnished! There are not so many fancy articles, of course. They never furnish such things in hotels, and I'm sure I don't want them. I have enough fancy articles of my own, but the furniture is much handsomer, heavy and dark. And dismal, interrupted her husband. I have an idea of just how it looks. I don't admire such furniture. I like these rooms better than any I ever had. How came you to be wandering over hotel rooms? You have no acquaintances there, have you? Mrs. Boyd is boarding there, and I have met her several times. But you have no calling acquaintance with her? She has never called on you, has she? No, and I didn't call on her. She is in an impatient tone, accompanied by an impatient rearrangement of the pillows. I just stepped in there this morning to look at the rooms. Mrs. Boyd told me yesterday that they were vacant, and I wanted to see them. Then I hope you will excuse me for telling you that I think you did a very foolish thing, and one that will give rise to unnecessary talk, for I haven't the slightest intention of going to a hotel to board. I must say, Mr. Tresavond, that I think in so simple a matter as a boarding-place, I might be allowed to have a voice, and the ever-ready tears showed signs of springing up in Mrs. Tresavond's eyes. Her husband drew in his feet, sat erect, and spoke seriously. My dear Laura, you know I always consult your preferences whenever it is possible, but in this case I think you are being unreasonable. There is no earthly reason why we should change our boarding-place. We have delightful rooms and every comfort and luxury that could be imagined, and our host and hostess are constant and unfailing in their attention to our comfort. Now what more could you ask? A great deal, and the tears drew back leaving a flash in her eyes. I would rather live in an attic on bread and water than to board here. I don't like Mrs. Sales. She is a smooth-faced, deceitful hypocrite. I never could endure people who were so painfully perfect. I don't like your pattern of propriety, Miss Bronson, any better. I just feel all the time as if I were a prisoner, and they were spies on me, and they are, too. I think all this is utterly absurd and unreasonable, Mr. Tresavond answered in that exasperating tone of calm superiority, which gentlemen understand so well how to assume. Mrs. Sales seems to me a meek, inoffensive, well-meaning little woman, and there are few young ladies like Miss Del Bronson. I should hope so, an insufferable prig if ever there was one. It is a great pity you did not select her for a wife since you have such an unbounded admiration for her. Mr. Tresavond bent forward suddenly and picked an invisible shred from the carpet. When he spoke again, his voice was somewhat constrained. I would have some regard for common sense in my remarks if I were you. Well, said Mrs. Tresavond, I am not happy here. I am miserable. If you are contented and happy, I suppose that is all that is necessary, but I wish I were at home with my mother. I wish I had never left her, and then the waiting tears burst forth in a perfect torrent. Mr. Tresavond looked distressed. He was by nature a gentle, tender-hearted man. He was almost afraid of tears. He had sometimes real qualms of conscience over his unkindness in lifting the spoiled and petted child of fortune out of the downy nest of home and bring her into such a different atmosphere, subject to cares and responsibilities which he was about as well qualified to assume as a bird would have been. And yet the nest to which he brought her was surely not lacking in down. And again he looked up and down the well-appointed room. He was certainly as elegant a spot as any to which she could have been accustomed. But meantime Mrs. Tresavond's sobs were becoming more emphatic than something must be done. Laura, he said at last, in tones full of distress, I do hope you will not make yourself ill. I am sure there is nothing within my power that I am not ready to do for your comfort and happiness. But really this thing is not feasible. When there is no earthly necessity for doing so, I must say that I cannot conscientiously go to a hotel to board. I should like to know why, came to him in muffled tones from the depths of the pillows. Because it is, in a sense, countenancing the indiscriminate sale of intoxicating liquors of which neither you nor I approve. Mrs. Tresavond stayed her tears and sat up to answer him. I should really like to know what sense there is in that. You don't have to board in the bar room nor buy liquor nor drink it. No, but you say by your presence there that you think the business is perfectly legitimate and you have no objection to it. Carol, I think that is utter nonsense. Why do you say such a thing? You don't patronize his liquors only his boarding-house. Such fanaticism as that is equal to Miss Bronson herself. No wonder she hates hotels. All her knowledge of them is derived from that little low-hole of a tavern where she lived. You stop at first-class hotels when you are traveling. Why do you if it is wicked to patronize them? That is different, said Mr. Tresavond, who really was not thoroughly posted on this subject, and did not detect all the sophistry of his wife's reasoning. I am traveling. There is nothing else that can be done. I am obliged to patronize hotels. But here we are all settled and perfectly comfortable. I am not comfortable, came in the sepulchral voice. His wife had gone down into the pillows again. I am not comfortable. I am miserable. I wish I had never left my own home. I hate this place. I don't care. And the close of the sentence was lost in sobs. Mr. Tresavond sprang up suddenly. His irritable flesh and blood were not in condition to endure more just then. From the distant parlor there issued strains of wonderful tender music. The piano was being guided by a singularly skillful hand whose touch he knew. The minister felt the need of something soothing and thither he went. Del and Mrs. Dr. Douglas were the occupants of the room. He went over to the piano and tried to get calm down with the influence of the weird gentle melody. Now it does seem to me that there are times when it is almost a pity that people cannot be gifted with clairvoyance or whatever name you might call the power to know of certain things that have just been transpiring in a place where you are not. For instance, could Mrs. Douglas in some mysterious manner have been made aware of the scene in which her pastor had just escaped? Could she have known of the really earnest effort that he had made to be patient and argumentative? It is not probable that she would have chosen this particular time to say what she did the moment Del's fingers strayed from the keys. Mr. Tressavant, I heard some astonishing news about you this morning. Ah, Mr. Tressavant said, trying to smile and look what he did not feel, vis, social and comfortable. News is very plentiful and very cheap I have observed. Am I to be informed of the nature of this last manufacturer? Oh yes indeed, for I am in haste to hear you deny it. I heard that you were going to the Park Street Hotel to board. The shadow of a smile left Mr. Tressavant's face and his brow clouded over. I am sorry to disappoint you, he said, hodlily, but I have no special denial to make. Why, is it really true? Not that I know of, but I certainly shall not trouble myself to deny all the statements that people may choose to make. I should probably be full of business if I pursued that course. Mrs. Douglas laughed. I begin to breathe freely, she said merrily. You frightened me. I thought you really had some idea of it. Would such an event be so very alarming, Mrs. Douglas? Indeed it would. The idea of a minister of the gospel being obliged to board, where they sold rum, would be too much of a mixture in these days of advanced ideas on that subject. People do not all think alike on that subject, however, even though ideas have advanced, said the minister, feeling in a particularly belligerent state of mind and somewhat indifferent as to which side he fought. No, I know they don't, answered Mrs. Douglas. More's the pity, as Grandma Porter says. But clergymen as a class are on the right side of the question nowadays, are they not? That depends on what you consider the right side, Mr. Trecevant answered promptly, remembering his old talks with Del Bronson and believing that he had a character for consistency to maintain. If you mean that the clergy as a class deplored drunkenness as a great moral evil, and hope and pray that it may be swept from the land, then I think they all will be found on that side. But if you mean that sort of advocacy of temperance that proposes to march up to a man who has a right to quite as much liberty of action as I have, and say to him, here, sir, you shan't drink another drop of liquor as long as you live, or that, when it comes in contact with men who get their living by the liquor traffic, puts on a sort of I am holier than now expression, and passes by on the other side, then I confess to you that some of us have too vivid a sense of the meaning of the word liberty and too humiliating a sense of our own shortcomings to assume either of these styles. Mrs. Douglas looked somewhat puzzled and answered half laughingly half in earnest, I am not sure that I fully comprehend your position, only I don't see why I should associate with the man who murders my neighbor through rum any more than I would if he murdered him with powder, and why should a man have liberty to kill himself with liquor, and not liberty to do it with a lot in them, those nice distinctions are really very puzzling to me. Whereupon she announced her intention of hunting up Abbey, gathered her gloves and wrap about her, and took her departure. Del still remained at the piano, touching the keys very softly occasionally, and Mr. Tressavant paced the floor in a state of vexation difficult to describe. Everybody seemed bent on running a thwart him that afternoon, and having arrived at that interesting stage where he felt an irresistible desire to continue the irritating process with somebody, he presently halted near Del, speaking almost sharply. I suppose you are fully in sympathy with Mrs. Douglas's extreme views. Del turned half round on the piano stool, and answered promptly, I have not found occasion to change my opinions on that subject with the lapse of time. With the removal of the immediate cause of your bitterness of feeling in regard to the subject, I had hoped that your feelings had modified and taken on the garb of charity. This seemed to Del such a harsh and unwarrantable illusion to her heavy and sorrowful past that it brought the flash to her eyes which he very well remembered. However, she answered him calmly enough. There was no immediate cause, Mr. Tressavant, and principles do not change. My father's manner of life and his home were great and bitter trials to me, but were not by any means the foundation of my principles. If let me ask you, said Mr. Tressavant, veering suddenly from his subject, do you really consider it inconsistent with the principles of a temperance man to board at a hotel? Yes, sir, I do. That is, if you mean a hotel where they keep a bar and deal out poison by the glass or pint. Why is it, he asked impatiently, producing his wife's argument, he is not obliged to patronize the bar nor to advocate liquor-drinking. Yet he does both indirectly. He gives countenance to the house by his presence, plainly stating that he considers it a proper place and the business in which it engages legitimate and respectable. I don't accept that view of the subject. Suppose you try it, Del, said Cooley. Take up your abode in some liquor-selling hotel and then preach a sermon to your young men in treating them to keep away from such places, urge them to consider it a disgrace to be seen coming out of the left-hand door which leads to the bar, while you ten times a day come from the right-hand door close beside it. People are very apt to confuse doors under such circumstances. I should not preach any such sermon, said Mr. Tressavant, taking up his line of march across the room again. I preach the gospel. Del laughed it must be confessed a little scornfully. Mr. Tressavant was so manifestly in ill humor, he was so thoroughly acting the character of a cross-boy instead of a Christian minister. His last sentence had sounded so very purel, so utterly senseless in the light of the present day, that she could not help the touch of scorn. He did not seem to notice it, however, but continued rapidly. Pray, Miss Bronson, what do you extreme people do when you are traveling? You are obliged to enter the unclean places then. I know it, said Del frankly, and I consider it a very puzzling question. I don't know what will be done until the temperance movement has taken another stride onward, and given Christian people hotels where they can stop without violating their Christian principles. I know that one man does now. When my uncle travels, he inquires in all directions for temperance houses, and if he finds one, no matter how poor or forlorn or how ill-kept it is, he braves the discomforts rather than swell the profits of a rum-seller. Which is a very quixotic idea, in my opinion. It will take some time to reform the world by that process I fancy. Miss Bronson, I don't believe you can ever save men by professing to be so much better than they are. And I don't believe you can ever save drunkards by making rum-selling respectable. However, if I believed that people boarded at hotels for the purpose of saving men, I should certainly honor their motives more than I now do if I couldn't honor their judgment. That is just the point. You extremists never give people credit for right motives, unless they work in the exact line that you have marked out. Mr. Trecevon, do you believe that Christian men go to liquor-selling hotels to board, because they think they can by that means lessen the mischief that is done by the sale of liquor? That is a question which I consider every man has a right to settle with his own conscience. Del turned impatiently to the piano again, what sense was there in trying to argue with a man who jumped a point as fast as he reached it? One thing she said, however, that she would have left unsaid if she had known Mr. Trecevon as well as one would think she might have done by this time. I can tell you one thing about many of your people. They would be deeply pained if you should countenance a liquor-selling hotel. There is a very strong temperance element among them, Mr. Sales says, and they desire as a church to take very high ground on this question. My people must learn that they have not a machine nor a puppet for a pastor. It is a clergyman's place to lead his people, not be led by them, and the sooner this people understand it, the more comfortable it will be for both parties. And then Mr. Trecevon was deluged by a perfect storm of music from the indignant piano in the midst of which he escaped. CHAPTER XII. There is treasure to be desired and oil in the dwelling of the wise, but a foolish man spendeth it up. Two most thoroughly uncomfortable beings were Del Bronson and Mr. Trecevon. He, on his part, went directly to his room, paused long enough to discover that his wife had forgotten her tears in slumber, then donned coat and boots and went moodily out, downtown, with no other purpose in view than getting rid of himself. Now what, in the name of common sense, was the trouble with Mr. Trecevon? Could he think one thing when he was talking with his wife and decidedly another thing when he talked with someone else? Indeed, it would have been very difficult for Mr. Trecevon to answer that question. He struggled vainly to answer it satisfactorily to himself. Was he really one who cared nothing in his heart for the temperance question? On the contrary, he would have been heartily glad to see that evil thing in temperance uprooted from the land. He still differed and differed honestly from many ways that people had of doing this thing, though his convictions as to his way being right and theirs wrong were not so marked and positive as they once were. But it was such an unpleasant thing, so utterly revolting, to imagine himself talked about, his plans and intentions discussed and commented upon. People actually trying to lay out a road and say to him, You walk in that, as if he were not capable of judging for himself. As if it were any one's business what I do or where I live, he said, drying himself up proudly and growing angry again over the thought. Now there is no question in my mind but that ministers affairs are too narrowly looked into, the question as to whether he will make his woodpile at the right or left side of his woodshed, or plant potatoes or peas at the further end of his garden, or questions which it seems to me might safely be left to his own discretion. Yet how many a minister actually glories in this spirit of planning that is a glow in his parish? Why? Because he is not capable of or does not like to plan for himself? Not a bit of it, but because the planning is an index of the loving helpful spirit that pervades his people. It is not a narrow spirit of management, it is born of love. Who cares where the man who keeps the corner grocery piles his wood? Indeed, they hardly care whether or not he has any wood to pile. But the minister belongs to the people, yes he does, and the true minister glories in the thought. They love him, else very few of them would trouble their heads about him, except indeed to keep a diary of his faults. And if their management does occasionally leap its bounds and arrange for him matters that come within his own private province, he considers the hearts that prompted the act and is joyful still. No such considerations came to Mr. Tresavon's aid. He had not fostered them in his heart. He had gone through all his life thus far, looking right and left for people who were trying to control him. It was the old perverse, unquenchable eye springing up at every step of the way to confront him. Why, the man had actually married his wife in a spirit of indignation at Del Bronson for presuming to think that she could change his views and fashion him to suit herself. Not that he knew this, not that he by any means realized when he vowed before God and man to love and cherish Laura Elliott that he was taking these vows upon him because Del Bronson did not think he would, and it was to be a lesson to her for presuming to dictate to him. If he had realized this, he would have shrunken from himself in terror and disgust. The trouble is that he did, as he always had done, nursed his injured feelings until they swelled into wrath, worked at the molehill day and night with all his might until he piled it into a mountain, considered himself an insulted man, and immediately cast about him for the most marked way of showing people that he did not care. Being the man that he was and following out first impulses as he generally did, it will not appear strange to you that on this particular afternoon he did precisely what two hours before he had not the slightest idea of doing, went directly to the hotel and engaged the vacant rooms, making arrangements for an immediate removal. Then he felt better and walked the streets more composedly. Had he not vindicated his right to do exactly as he pleased without regard to the opinions or expressions of others, yet before that afternoon was over this man heartily repented his hasty act. He would have given a great deal to undo it. He felt himself going contrary to, not exactly his convictions, but a donning sense of duty. Well, why not undo the work? It was easily enough accomplished. He knew that it was a favorite hotel and that these were favorite rooms, that at least two parties would be disappointed in their plans of going thither by his prompt action. Ah, then there loomed up before him that awful question, what will people think, which is really one of the very worst questions that can haunt a self-conscious man. They would consider it a very strange proceeding. They would think he feared unpleasant consequences that he had not courage to brave public opinion, and Mr. Trecevant was willing to have them think anything in the world of him rather than that. Come what would, he was going to that hotel to board. Del Bronson went upstairs feeling strangely forlorn and desolate. Her conversation with Mr. Trecevant had revived old memories, buried hopes, or at least buried fancies. And at one period of our girlhood they are just as hard to bury as if they were real tangible hopes. What faith she once had in Mr. Trecevant? How earnestly she believed that whatever he did was from conscientious motives. How sure she was that God would lead him into just the right way. Remember that there was a time when all the dear and misty and altogether beautiful future was intertwined with thoughts of him. Now indeed she looked back on all those dreams and smiled, but it was a sad, sickly smile. Del Bronson was no sentimental girl in her teens, breaking her heart because the one whom she once looked on as her probable future husband was the husband of another. It had been a very long time since she thought of him in any such connection. She knew long ago that whatever that brief passage of their lives might have been to him, with her it was a mistaken fancy from which God had mercifully preserved her. She did not love Mr. Trecevant. More than that she had known this long time that she never did love him, but she wanted, oh, so much to respect him. It is a dozen times harder to cease respecting a person who has once come very near to you than it is to cease loving him, or at least to cease imagining that you love him. Del would have liked to feel for Mr. Trecevant a genuine hearty earnest respect. She would have liked to accord to him all due and gracious reverence as a minister of the gospel, and every day he made this harder to do. How could she look up to and respect a man who acted like a tempestuous child on the smallest provocation? There had been times when, if she could have taken him by the hand and led him to a dark closet and closed the door upon him, bidding him remain there in solitude until he could be a better boy, she would have felt it to be much more in keeping with their relative characters than the positions which they now occupied. All these things and some others combined to make her sad. Dosing in his words had recalled to her a sense of the loneliness of her life. He had referred to her father cruelly heartlessly, she thought. Now Del had been true to her woman's nature in that the last year of her father's life had covered over all the dreary years going before. Her father, of whom Mr. Trecevant spoke so slidingly, was never the red-faced, bleer-eyed, wretched man who used to sit in half-drunken stupidity dozing before the fire in that awful bar-room. He was a helpless, grey-haired old man, looking always faultlessly clean and neat, bending earnest, tender eyes on the pages of the large old Bible, following her about the room with those same eyes full of unutterable love. How Del loved that memory! That was her father, who had given all the love of his heart to her and her only. Now she was alone. There were Uncle Edward and Aunt Laura, yes, so there were, and never were their dearer hearts for one to rest upon. But then, thought Del sadly, sitting down on the couch before the west window, but then they are not my father and mother. They love me, don't I know that they do, with all their hearts. But when I'm away they don't miss me as they would if I were their very own. The truth is I don't belong to anybody, that is, I'm not absolutely essential to anybody in this world. If I had a sister now, younger than myself, say, to look after and care for, but she would go and get married before I had realized that she was anything but a little girl. Seems to me I am young to be stranded on the beach, with such an all-alone feeling in my heart. Oh, I have friends, of course I have plenty of them, but if I should die they would just miss me a little. Uncle Edward and Aunt Laura would a great deal, and they would all speak of me tenderly and lovingly and shed some tears, and after a little life would go on for them just about the same. She leaned from the window and plucked the leaves from a climbing vine and picked them in pieces, winking hard, meantime, to keep a tear or two from falling on them. Then she laughed a little as this girl was apt to do, even in her most thoughtful moments, and continued her thinking aloud. Well, what of it? Are you going to be doleful because there isn't anywhere in the world a single heart that would break if you were gone? To persons of unselfish natures that ought to be a subject for thanksgiving. Don't you go into being lackadaisical, Del Bronson? People are insufferable, especially at your age. Remember you are no longer a very young lady. It is really fortunate that this mood doesn't possess me very often. I shouldn't, in that case, consider it worthwhile to miss even myself. It's extraordinary that I should have blundered into the state of mind today, and it is especially strange that that ridiculous talk with that ridiculous man should have been the occasion of it. Why can't he be a man? You have one thing, certainly, to be forever grateful over Del Bronson, and that is that you are not his wife. What a life we should lead! Ah, me! I wonder if I disappoint any one in my character as thoroughly as that man does me. I knew he wasn't perfect years ago, but I thought he was a good man. Well, I think so still, and I will think so. Saying which she arose suddenly, brushed the torn leaves from the window-seat, and said aloud in her old brisk tone, I'll find something to do for somebody. That is a great antidote for the blues, if this is a species of blues that hangs about me today. Then after a pause in gentler, tenderer tone, something to do for the king, my father, I have not thought enough about that of late. I must not forget to prepare for my appearance in court. As she turned from the window a breath of something sweet floated toward her. She looked around for the producing cause. A single tee rose glowed in her little lily-shaped base on the mantle. These rose and Abbey's hand had placed it there since dinner. She glanced about her for some other evidence of Abbey's call. Ah! Behind the vase lay a letter. She seized it eagerly. Letters were very delightful creations to Dell. A nice thick letter, not in Uncle Edward's handwriting, though, but there were bright roses on her cheek as she recognized the hand. My dear friend, thus the letter ran, you will feel interested, I think, to hear that seminary life is over for me, was indeed some six weeks ago. But besides being very busy, there are other considerations that delayed my writing. I am located for a year supplying the Second Church of Rockton during the absence of its pastor in Europe. A formidable undertaking, it seems to me, who imbued a child in the new life and who really feels so ill-prepared for the solemn work. But the hand of God seemed to point unmistakably in this direction, and all work for Christ is solemn, perhaps this not more so than others. The responsibilities are wider than they would be in a smaller field. I am not sure that they are greater. The people have greeted me with the utmost kindness and cordiality. With the place I believe you are familiar, so I need not speak of that. Now, do you know I am aware that this letter is moving on in a very stiff, proper way, somewhat like the introduction to the sermon I am trying to write? In both cases it seems proper to expend a certain amount of time in commencing, while I really have that, both for the sermon and the letter, which weighs on my heart and which I long to reach. Shall we waive the introduction? Years ago, dear friend, I broached a subject to you which perhaps you have forgotten. You were very frank with me then. I thank you for it. I have hesitated long about writing this letter, lest it might be wrong in me, might be giving you unnecessary pain to bring this matter before you again. Yet I find that my heart clings very strangely to the little fragment of hope that, perhaps, lapse of time may have healed over a wound in your heart, and that you will let me plant a new germ there. I am aware that I am treading on dangerous ground. I do not know the nature of your confidence. I do not know whether the grave has closed over your plans. I want to touch with tender, reverent hand this past of yours, but, injustice to myself, I have decided that I must touch it. Just here let me stop to thank you for your letters, few as they have been. They have been very helpful to me. I feel that I shall do a better work for Christ because of some words written therein than I would have done without them. But now I have something to say that I fear will sound harshly, yet it must be said. They have been too helpful for me. I fear I have abused your trust. The cheery, friendly letters that you have occasionally sent me I have tried to respond to in the same strain. Del, the time has come when I can do this no longer. I have decided to be frank with you and tell you so, even at the risk of having no more words from you. But I feel that I can write no more such replies to you as I have been able to do. The letter was long, page after page, closely written. Certainly the young minister, whoever he was, could hardly expect to have time to write often such letters as that one. Del knew very well indeed who it was from. She did not need to turn to the signature, which nevertheless she did, and read Homer M. Nelson over and over again with dancing eyes. There were sentences in that letter, written evidently, with much hesitancy and pain, that seemed positively ludicrous to Del. The wound in her heart, indeed. If there ever had been one there, what had become of it? No, the grave had not closed over her plans. What an amusing satisfaction it would be to tell him all about it. That instead of any such heavy sorrow, there had mercifully interposed another marriage wherein she had not been considered. And yet it would be mortifying to tell him who that other really was. What would he think of her having fancied herself satisfied with that nature whose depth she knew he had sounded? When the long letter was finally concluded, all the somberness had gone out of Del's heart and life, all the merriment had gone from her eyes, in their place was a sweet tender peace. She arose from her chair and stood irresolute a moment as if uncertain amid all this new rush of feeling what to do next. Then suddenly she dropped upon her knees and her first words were, My father, I thank thee that thou hast had thy way from first to last with thy sinful, blundering, impatient child, and hast led me through many and unknown byways into the light and joy of human love. CHAPTER XIII OF WISE AND OTHERWISE Oh, that they were wise that they understood this. Now you shall have a glimpse of Jane's room. Jane was Mrs. Sales Cook and a character in her way with views and feelings decidedly her own. Her room was up a second flight of stairs and the windows looked out on the strawberry beds and in the distance the vegetable garden, prospects that Jane thoroughly appreciated and enjoyed. It was no seven by nine box of a room. There were no such sleeping rooms in Mrs. Sales' household. She held to the unreasonable idea that if small, close sleeping apartments were unhealthy for the mistress they were equally so for the maid. So this was a good, generous room requiring thirty yards of yardwide carpeting to cover it, and this carpet was small and dainty in figure, bright and coloring and fresh and clean. There were no odd pieces among the chamber furniture, since it all had to be new, the mistress saw no reason why it should not be neat and well chosen. She even chose it with an eye to the color of the carpet and paper on the walls, knowing meantime that it was to grace her cook's room. Well why not, cooks have eyes. There was a good, wholesome glass set on the bureau which neither made you look squint-eyed nor green in color. The bed was neatly spread in white, even the pillowcases had a little row of frilling around the edge. Under the wash stand was a gas fixture, another by the bureau. The hot and cold water pipes had not been forgotten in this room, and there was a plentiful supply of soaps and towels. On the low, wide window seat there grew and blossomed a pot of roses, another of geranium, and one little spray of mignonette. These were gifts from Mrs. Sales, and cherished by stern-visaged Jane as no owner of a conservatory ever thought of cherishing his choicest plants. There were pictures, too, on the walls, a photograph of Mrs. Sales, another of baby Essie, a pretty engraving or two, and one dainty chrome. Jane's own personal property these were, gifts from time to time, presented by the master and mistress, or sometimes from baby Essie herself. And this was the cook's room, aye it was, and she was sole occupant of it, too. The house was large and means were plenty, and there was no need, Mrs. Sales thought, of stifling little tender seeds and choking good resolves, that might perhaps find lodgement in some girl's heart if they were not frittered away by idle gossip, or plucked up by the roots by some unsympathetic eye that must needs be always with her. Mrs. Sales believed it was a means of grace to give every heart a chance for quiet communion with its inner self. Now what a chorus of indignant voices could I hear above my ears, if I could only be invisibly present while some half dozen mistresses of houses and servants were reading and discussing this description of Jane's room, I distinctly hear them. The idea, says one, perfectly absurd, echoes another. Some ridiculous old maid wrote that who never kept house and never had a servant spatters an indignant third-party. I beg your pardon, my dear madam, I am not an old maid, and I have kept house and had a servant. And did you give her a room like the one you have been describing? And now the entire six sit up straight in various stages of exasperation and await my answer. No, ma'am, I didn't. Let me tell you why. I had no such fair and beautiful room in my whole house as the one I have been describing. But I did the best I could. I had the bed furnishings whole and neat and clean. I had little toilet glass and wash bowl and pitcher on the wash stand. If I could not find carpeting enough to cover the whole room, I always managed a square bit for the front of the bedstead and another for the wash stand. I always managed to introduce some means of warmth into the room if the thing were possible. I do not mean that I gave my very best and brightest things to my hired servant. Mrs. Sales did not. You should have seen her guest chamber. I only mean that there was no awful incongruity between the servant's room and every other abiding place. It is not everyone that can lavish the dainty beauty on their cook's room that Mrs. Sales did on hers. But the people are very few, who, living with many of the comforts of life about themselves, have need to deprive their hired help of the common necessaries we're with to make a decent and cleanly toilet. And the people are very many who do just that thing. I have had occasion several times in my life to glance for a minute into servant's rooms in my passage through grand houses, and the sight has made me angry. Amid all this American hue and cry of poor help, it is time that someone took up the countercry of poor mistresses, miserable mistresses, who smuggled their hired girls into miserable addicts and give them nothing wherewith to be comfortable or even decent. Well, at the door of Jane's large bright room stood Mrs. Sales gently tapping. It was another of this strange woman's strange ideas that she saw no earthly reason why she should be at liberty to burst, without warning or invitation, into her servant's room when to do so with any other member of her household would be a gross impertinence. So she tapped gently and waited her invitation to enter. In her hand she carried a tiny jar with a spray of ivy just springing into life. Mrs. Sales Cook had nerves. She belonged unmistakably to that class of people who have nothing to do with such inconvenient articles. She had not even seen better days. In fact, these days wherein she rained supreme in the great airy, well-appointed kitchen were really Jane's very palmiest ones, and yet there came to her times when the oven would be a shade too hot or not quite hot enough, when chairs would tip over and milk spill and dish towels drop without any apparent cause for such insane proceedings. And strange to say, Jane's temper seemed to be no more strongly fortified on such occasions than if she belonged to a higher order of humanity. On this particular day her nerves had evidently been tried. Others had gone awry with her since she first made her appearance in the kitchen with a gloomy face and boxed little Tom's ears for scattering ashes on the hearth. The toast, when it came up to the dining-room, was just a trifle scorched, and Mrs. Sales going down to speak about it afterward caught a glimpse of the solemn-faced creature and forebore. It was evidently no time in which to bring forward a plea for toast. There was no telling what had rasped the unsteady nerves. And really, for the time it did not matter what had, since trouble manufactured out of a molehill, after it has loomed into a mountain, is, while the vision lasts, just about as hard to endure as though it were a real mountain. So the mistress spoke gently, praised the manner in which the eggs were cooked, instead of finding fault with the toast, and immediately sent upstairs for Hannah to come and lighten some of the cares of the kitchen. A very singular mistress was Mrs. Sales. So here she stood, gently tapping at her servant's door and presently entered, in response to a somewhat surly invitation to do so. Jane sat over by the window where the sunlight did not come, sewing hard and fast on a coarse, thick garment. Mrs. Sales commenced her sentence the minute she had closed the door. Here, Jane, is the ivy slip I promised you. It has rooted at last, but it required an immense amount of coaxing to make it do so. Thank you, ma'am," Jane said, still in a somewhat surly tone, and added grimly. It takes a power of fussing to make some things come out right, and then they won't after all is said and done. Nevertheless she bestowed sundry little loving touches on the thrifty green leaves of the ivy, as she made room in the window-seat for the pot. Mrs. Sales helped herself to a chair. What is that long seam, Jane? Won't the machine sew it? The machine is busy, ma'am, and this seam is in a hurry. Oh, there is nothing so very important for the machine today. I just came from the sewing-room. Based it up, Jane, and then based in a hem, if it is to be hemmed, and I'll send it up to Maria. It is a wrapper, isn't it? For your father? How nice that will be! But doesn't it need more cutting out in front? I'm sure I don't know, ma'am," Jane said in despairing tones. It's the witchetest acting being I ever see, anyway, and I've been that tried with it that if there was a fire in the grate, I'm thinking I'd stuff the thing in. No sermon on the sin of impatience did Mrs. Sales preach unless the sermon was in her gentle, sympathetic tones. Let me take it a moment. Now lend me your scissors. Yes, it needs cutting out a little more and trimming off, and the collar isn't quite right. If you will thread me a needle, I will base it on a trifle higher. I had trouble with Mr. Sales's last winter, so I am posted. I've let it out and puckered it in and turned it backward and forward until I don't know which is head and which is tail, said poor Jane in desperation, and I never knew how to make one of them things anyway. Then I wonder that you have succeeded so well. They are hard to make. This is going to be very nice. It only needs a little alteration. Was it because of your haste with this that you did not get out to the prayer meeting last evening? Jane's warm red face grew redder, but she answered promptly. No, ma'am, it wasn't that. I stayed with father all the evening, but it wasn't that either. Father slept all the while, and mother was there and Susan. And I could have gone just as well as not if I'd wanted to. But I didn't feel no hankering after the meeting, and that's the long and short of it. Didn't you feel the need of any help? Yes, ma'am, I did, plenty of it. But I didn't expect to get none there. And, ma'am, that's exactly what I want to speak to you about. I've pretty near made up my mind to go to the other church. This was spoken with a rather defiant air, and Jane looked as though she expected and were fully prepared to meet opposition. Her mistress took the matter very calmly, indeed, only asking in quiet tones. Do they have a different savior at the other church? No, ma'am, said Jane abashed. But they do have a different minister. They do so. And it's just come to that pass with me. I can't get along with Mr. Tressavant no longer. Him and me has got to go different ways. A body has feelings, Mrs. Sales. And they can't get along without them. And I'm free to confess that I can't get along with mine. I've stood a great deal and kept in my place and said nothing. But I ain't going to do it no more. What is the trouble, Jane? You haven't told me how your feelings have been hurt. Well, ma'am, it ain't easy told. It ain't like a big stab with a knife that bleeds and makes a fuss and has everybody see it. It is just pins, little mites of them at that, pricking into you here and there every hour. The long and short of it is I'm used to being treated decent. I ain't a fool. I don't expect them to invite me into their parlor to spend the afternoon. Though for the matter of that I've been in Mrs. Mulford's parlor and stayed an hour at a time. But I do want to be spoke to as if I was a human being and not an animal. Mr. Tresavante is certainly not unkind to you, Jane. Mrs. Sales-Tone was somewhat startled and James Similes were rather striking. But Jane herself was entirely composed and answered promptly. No, ma'am, he ain't, neither to me nor to Nero, and he treats us both about alike. I'm a decent woman and I conduct myself respectable, continued Jane, waxing eloquent. But I'm a member of his church, and it ain't no more than fair that he should have a word to speak to me now and then. Oh, Jane, I'm afraid you're a little bit foolish about this. Don't you know gentlemen get used to seeing the same people about them day after day and don't think to speak to them? Oh, yes, said Jane, nodding her head with indignant emphasis. I know all about it. I haven't been about him near so long as I have about Mr. Sales, and he always thinks to speak a pleasant word. But Mr. Tresavante is different from Mr. Sales. He is absent-minded. He don't speak to me half the time when I meet him in the halls, but I don't get offended about it. It isn't that, said Jane, jerking her thread with an impatient air. Why, ma'am, you know I ain't a fool, and I don't want folks to pull ever to me, nor make any fuss about taking notice of me. It's just that once in a while I like to have my minister act as if I was a human being and had got a soul. I can't explain to you how it is, but I can feel it. Mr. Tresavante don't know nor care no more about me than if I was that black cricket there on the hearth, and he takes pains to show it, too. Why, land alive, if he took half the trouble to notice me that he does to show that he looked over and around and above me, I'd be set up with importance. And as for her, there's no pleasing of her. I'm expected to know without telling which night she wants her toast wet and which night she wants it left dry, and I do, too, for that matter. I know that the night I leave it dry she wants it wet. I can't suit her know-how to try my best, and it's plenty of sour looks and cross words I get from her, and it don't stand to reason that I can be pricked forever and not get rough. But that's neither here nor there, after all. I could bear all them things and not say a word and go down on my knees to both of them all my days if he would be kind of nice like to father. But when it comes to neglecting of him, that's more than flesh and blood can stand. I know, Mrs. Sayle said, with exceeding gentleness, it is very hard for us to fancy that those we love are neglected. But I think that we are very apt to forget that in a large congregation like Mr. Tresivant's there are always many sick ones, and that the clergymen has only a little time to divide among them all. Mine sowed on grimly. It's a queer kind of dividing, she said at last. It ain't more than ten steps from Judge Barnett's gate to ours, and Mr. Tresivant has been in there every single day since Judge Barnett hurt his arm, and he ain't no need of him either. For everyone says he is getting on fine and will be out in a few days. And there's my father, who ain't set foot out of doors, it will be thirteen weeks next Sunday. Sad more than that, he never will again. And no minister ever comes near him. That's more than my blood can bear. And poor Jane's tears fell thick and fast among the stitches that she was vainly trying to take. Her nerves had decidedly got the better of her. Her mistress stitched away in pitying silence for a little while, then asked gently, Did you ever tell Mr. Tresivant how ill your father was? You know he is a newcomer here, and I dare say does not hear of half the sick ones. We are all careless in that respect. I've not been careless, man, you may be sure, with my father lifting a corner of the curtain when the minister comes out of Judge Barnett's side door to see if his turn is coming, and then dropping it patient-like and saying, Ah, well, he hasn't time to-day most likely. Yes, I told him all about my father, how he used to be at meeting regular and at prayer meeting, and how he loved them, and how sick he was, and how the doctor said he would never be any better, and how much he longed to see his new minister. I've told him a dozen times, and he said, I'll look in on him some day when I have time. And when last I spoke to him he made no answer at all, and she said, How that creature does pester one about her father? CHAPTER XIV I heard her say it, ma'am, with my own ears, and do you think I want any such minister's wife as that? It was very clear to Mrs. Sales-Mind that she was not gaining ground. There was no use in trying to smooth over Mr. Trecevon's main fault to this excited, filial-hearted girl. Her own slights she could forget, but neglect of the sick and dying father was harder to endure. Her mistress deeply sympathized with her, and in truth was not a little startled over her pastor's neglect as she knew that her husband had made a special request to him to call on Jane's father. She chose a new style of argument. After all, Jane, do you suppose your sole object in uniting with the Regent Street Church was because the pastor was kind to you and thoughtful of your comfort? Had you no better motive than that? One church is as good as another, Jane said evasively. It don't matter which I go to. Ah, you mustn't deceive yourself with that thought. If you were about to unite with a church for the first time, it would perhaps make little difference which you would have a perfect right to take your choice. But to change from one church to another is a different matter. It always makes more or less talk, and the reason why should be quite plain, I think, and solemn enough to overbalance whatever might be said to the injury of the church. Oh, but, ma'am, interrupted Jane with a sort of sharp humility. Who is there to know or care what church I go to or whether I go at all or not? I ain't of any kind of consequence, not even to my minister, and if he don't care, who should? Is that quite honest, Jane? Mrs. Sales asked, with penetrative gentleness, don't you know of quite a number who will talk about it and wonder over it? Your father and mother, for instance, and your sister Susan, who is not a Christian, and who is all the time watching to see whether you do things from right motives, and the girls at the mill who are your friends and are not Christians. Do you really think it would be for the glory of God for you to make all this talk and injure the usefulness of your pastor in the eyes of your friends? I can't help it, Jane said doggedly. If I went to Dr. Ransom's church, he would come and see father. I know he would. He looks just like he would come in a minute. And it's hard if father can't have a minister to speak a word to him once in a while. It's awful hard, Mrs. Sales. Them that hasn't tried it couldn't think what a hard thing it is to stand. Jane, said Mrs. Sales, her voice the while being very gentle and yet very solemn. Do you pray for Mr. Trecevant every day? No, ma'am. I don't know as I ever did. Oh, Jane, are you sure, then, that you have done your duty to him? I am certain you are not one who thinks that people have no duties toward their pastors. And what a very plain and simple one this is. Besides, is it possible that you have really desired to have Mr. Trecevant visit your father because of the help that it would be to him, and yet have never asked God to put it in your pastor's heart to do so? After all, are there not two sides to this question? Silence, then, in the room, Jane sewing away earnestly the flush on her face not dying out, new thoughts evidently stirring in her heart. After a little, Mrs. Sales spoke again very gently. I do not suppose Mr. Trecevant is perfect. I think him like the rest of us, a Christian who makes mistakes and leaves undone things that he ought to have done. You know he professes to be a mere man. He probably mourns over his own feelings just as we do over ours. The question is, when we come to our Savior every day with the story of our failings in duty, our sins of heart and tongue, and ask and expect to be forgiven, shall we be charitable only toward our own faults and mistakes, expecting God to overlook them and give us strength to try again, while we feel in our hearts bitterness toward some other Christian, and think because his mistakes are different from ours, that they are therefore greater, and we cannot overlook them, nor ask Christ to forgive them? Not one word said Jane. She sewed away with trembling fingers, once and again a tear plashed on the sleeve that she was sewing, and several times she took up a bit of her own sleeve and wiped her eyes. Mrs. Trecevant's voice presently broke the stillness of the house. Hannah, I want you or Jane to come and wheel these trunks out of the clothes room for me right away. Yes, ma'am, they heard Hannah's voice in answer. I'll speak to Mrs. Sales. Jane, said Mrs. Sales softly, shall I tell Hannah to do it? And Jane arose with a resolute air. No, ma'am, you needn't. I'll tend to the trunks myself. I'm an old fool, that's what I am, and I thank you for putting me in the way to see it. And Jane went with determined tread out of the room. As for Mrs. Sales, she called Hannah and dispatched her to the sewing room with the dressing gown, with directions to the seamstress to sew the seams on the machine, and to finish the garment. Then she went downstairs to another ordeal. It was a different sort of one, but perhaps not any more comfortable to endure. She gave a little bit of a sigh when Hannah told her it was Mrs. Arnold who was waiting to see her. Now Mrs. Arnold belonged to that class of people who preface a great many of their remarks with, oh, have you heard, or don't you believe, or isn't it such a shocking affair? Just what would be occupying her well-stored mind at that particular moment Mrs. Sales felt it impossible to say, but that it would be something uncomfortable she felt quite safe in thinking. Also, as the day was waning, Mr. Sales had arrived and sat in the parlor entertaining their guest. And as Mrs. Arnold was not one of his favorites, his wife knew by past experience that his presence would not lessen her task. Del, too, was there, but Del had been for the last twenty-four hours in a remarkably subdued state of mind and might really be of service. Mrs. Arnold hardly waited until her hostess had greeted her before her voice took on that indescribable sound that betokens shocked astonishment. My dear Mrs. Sales, I have heard something today that I do hope and trust isn't true. Is it possible that your borders are going to leave you? Mrs. Sales winced a little. She had hoped that that news was too recent to have reached even Mrs. Arnold's ears, but she answered as lightly as possible. Why yes, Mrs. Arnold, you did not imagine that they were domesticated with me for life, did you? Oh, dear, no, I am sure it was delightfully kind and thoughtful in you to take them at all, such beautiful rooms as you have. I said at the time that it must be very hard for you to see them occupied with borders. Now herein lay one of the puzzling inconveniences in the way of carrying on a conversation with Mrs. Arnold. Her hostess knew her well enough to be certain that she must hasten forward an emphatic and positive disclaimer, or expect to hear herself reported as having said that she could not endure to have her exquisite rooms defiled by the presence of borders. Even in the face of the disclaimer it was not certain that Mrs. Arnold would remember to distinguish between sentences spoken by herself and those which emanated from her hostess. However, Mrs. Sales took all possible precaution by earnestly explaining and re-explaining her entire satisfaction with her present arrangements. Then why in the world do they leave you? How absurd in them when they are so elegantly located? And you really are willing to keep them? Why, dear me, I hadn't thought of that view of the case. I supposed, of course, that you were tired of them and I said to Mrs. Roberts that it certainly was no wonder. Of course you would prefer being alone to having any borders, but especially those who were constantly receiving so much company. Mrs. Roberts and I both agreed that it was really making too much of a hotel parlor of your elegant reception room. And you are willing to let them stay? Dear me, that is surprising. Poor little Mrs. Sales glanced appealingly at her husband. Evidently in shielding her own hospitable intentions, it had made matters worse for Mr. and Mrs. Tressavant. Mr. Sales joined in the conversation in a tone which sounded hopelessly frolicsome to his wife's ears. Don't you know, Mrs. Arnold, there is such a thing as being selfishly exclusive? Perhaps my wife and I think we have enjoyed a selfish monopoly of our pastor's society long enough and feel it our duty to pass him around among the outside world a little. But what a way to do it, exclaimed Mrs. Arnold, with more exclamation points in her words, and evidently detecting neither nonsense nor irony in the explanation. It seems such a strange thing for a clergyman to go to a hotel to board. Mr. Sales, you surely did not advise him to do that. As to advice, Mr. Sales answered, with the gravity of a judge. That is a matter which is entirely out of my province. I leave it entirely to my wife. Indeed, this whole business of what a clergyman shall or shall not do I consider to be in the hands of you ladies. You certainly are eminently fitted to look after him. On the whole Mr. Sales rather enjoyed his conversations with Mrs. Arnold. He could be as sarcastic as he chose without the least fear of being understood. Nothing daunted she pursued her theme. But I'm sure your wife didn't advise such a thing. She is too good a temperance woman. Mrs. Sales, don't you think it is a very singular proceeding? Mrs. Roberts says that she has heard rumors before that Mr. Tresavante was anything but staunch in his temperance principles, and this only confirms her in this belief. Miss Bronson, you came from his vicinity, I have heard. You ought to know something about his views. Is he really a temperance man? I never saw him intoxicated in my life, Miss Bronson replied with owlish salinity. Del exclaimed Mrs. Sales in positive pain while her husband laughed appreciatively. Well, Del said with fearless air, one might as well say that as anything else. In these enlightened days to hear a minister of the gospel calling question in regard to his temperance views is a new thing under the sun. I should as soon expect to be asked if he were a Christian. Not without some qualms of conscience did Del say this. Was it true? Yes, after due reflection she felt convinced that it was. She understood Mr. Tresavante better than he understood himself and felt certain that it was not rum but self that stood in his way. Mrs. Arnold regarded her in wondering silence for a moment, then returned to the precise point from which she had started, ignoring all that came between, as such natures generally do. Mrs. Sales, don't you think it a very strange proceeding? Why, Mrs. Sales asked, not for information but to gain time. Why because I think it is very strange. I don't know what people will think about it. You know dear Mr. Mulford was very strict on that question and he educated us all to his way of thinking. I don't believe the church will tolerate a pastor without temperance principles. Mrs. Arnold was one of those people who was given to sending dear Mr. Mulford dishes of brandy peaches and wine sauces and being offended when she learned that he never ate them, nor had the good man ever once had reason to hope that she was educated to his way of thinking. Don't you think, Mrs. Sales asked at last, speaking very gently, don't you think Mrs. Arnold it is an uncharitable conclusion to arrive at that because a man differs from us in his way of working out a principle, he must therefore be destitute of that principle? Mrs. Arnold never answered so obstrucic question in her life. It was not likely that she would do so now, but she answered nevertheless with great promptness. I think a man should be particular about his actions, a clergyman of all persons. Now Mrs. Sales, do you honestly think a hotel is the place for him? Mr. Sales came suddenly to the rescue. Aren't you wasting time, ladies? What is the use of discussing the question twice over keeping the man in suspense meantime? Why not let him have the benefit of the discussion as well as the decision? My dear, shall I summon Mr. Tressavant? Oh, mercy, no, Mrs. Arnold said in alarm, while Abby turned away her flushed face and coughed in order not to laugh or cry. She felt almost equally like doing either. I'm sure I don't want to see him, Mrs. Arnold continued. I shouldn't know what to say to him. What I should like to know is, just what you think of all this, dear Mrs. Sales, you are so ready to find excuses for people, but you are so very decided on the temperance question that Mrs. Roberts and I thought you would really be nonplussed this time. I can conceive, said Abby, speaking very slowly and hesitatingly, of reasons why Mr. Tressavant should consider it his duty to board in a hotel. He would thereby come in contact with people whom he couldn't otherwise hope to meet familiarly, and he might gain an influence over such and be the means of doing them good. And that is the reason why he goes there? I do not say I am giving his reasons, because I really have no business with his personal reasons for doing things. I simply say that I can understand how a good man might reason from such a standpoint. CHAPTER 15 I would have you wise unto that which is good. Mrs. Arnold arose and gathered her lace shawl about her. Well, with a little sigh that might have been indicative of either relief or disappointment, I am sure it's a new idea to me. I am very glad to hear that our pastor is governed by such motives. It may be, as you say, the means of doing good. At any rate I shall take pains to let people know how self-sacrificing he is in leaving your delightful home and enduring all the discomforts of hotel life merely in the hope of doing some good. It is quite the martyr's spirit. And then the hostess followed her wrestling collar from the room to endure as best as she could the finale of that terrible visit in the hall. That blessed little hypocrite is a benefactress to her sex, Mr. Sales said, the moment the door closed. She has actually given Mrs. Arnold a new idea, something that she hasn't received since her last call here I'll venture. I say, you silent woman over in the corner there, don't you wish you were as prompt to discern new ideas as some people are? What do you think of our pastor's martyr's spirit? There is some truth in it, Del said, with sudden gravity. I think he has probably argued himself into believing this very thing, a sort of all things to all men arrangement, you know. He is just the sort of man to reason out such an idea and cling to it. Some ideas need a tremendous clinging to in order to have anything left of them, and I should say this was one of them. But I do sincerely think so, Del said with earnestness. His ideas are peculiar, he has strange ways of reasoning, but I believe he has a hearty desire to do what will be for the best in the end. No doubt, Mr. Sales said dryly, I haven't the least idea but that Mrs. Tressavante is also actuated by the same lofty motives, have you? Something in his tone caused Del to say, with a self-deprecating laugh, Mr. Sales, I don't think you're inclined to help, as Abby calls it, a bit more than I am. I'm inclined to when I'm entirely under the influence of the blessed little woman herself. It is only the wicked spirit which your sympathetic nature arouses within me that exhibits itself to you. Why is it, do you suppose, that you and I are so prone to evil? I don't know, Del said sadly. You are ingest, and I am wholly in earnest. I would give anything in this world to have such a spirit as your wife possesses. I don't doubt it in the least, he answered eagerly. I never saw anyone like her. She lives in an atmosphere of purity. I should think you ladies would be specially inclined to jealousy because you see her life is so entirely foreign in spirit to that which your sex generally exhibits. The spirit of nonsense was rampant in Mr. Sales this evening. If he chanced to commence a sentence seriously, it ended in anything but an appropriate manner. Generally Del was a match for him, but tonight something had subdued and softened her. She made no attempt to answer the thrust at her sex, indeed she felt the truth of the justingly spoken words. Mrs. Sales entering at that moment, her husband turned to her. My dear, wouldn't it be well for you and me to go down to the Arbor Street restaurant to board? You know we might manage to gain an influence over people with whom you certainly will never be likely to come in contact in any other way. For all answer his wife dropped herself among the cushions of the couch whereon he was lounging, laid her head on his arm and burst into tears. This proceeding was so extraordinary that it thoroughly sobered and alarmed her husband and Del turned from the piano stool where she had just seated herself and looked with silent amazement on her friend. She cried occasionally, not often, but now and then, sometimes in sorrow and sometimes in sheer vexation over somebody or something, but Abby, gentle, quiet, evenly poised, sweetly tempered Abby, indulged once in a while in a little bit of an almost inward sigh that scarcely ruffled her fair brow, but beyond that she had seemed to those most familiar with her to live above the storms and frets and tears of life. My dear child, Mr. Sales said, gravely and tenderly, what is it? What can possibly have grieved you so? Has that intolerable woman been putting the finishing touches to her silliness? Oh, Jerome, his wife sobbed out, struggling vainly with her tears. It is such a strange world. People seem really glad to discover something that is wrong. They seem to delight to talk it over. I don't understand anybody. I seem to say things that are not quite true, or at least to make people think what isn't so, you know, when I try to make any explanations, and I don't know what to do. The very breadth and compass of this pitiful wail seem to strike her husband's ludicrous vein. Poor little troubled woman, he said in serial comic tones, couldn't she make the world over to suit her ideal? Would the people be just as stupid and just as wicked and just as silly despite all she could do? It is a great discouraging problem at which other brains than yours have worked, poor child, and the world isn't righted yet. No, she said wearily, it isn't that I want to make the world over. I am not so foolish as that. But I want to keep a lamp trimmed and burning in my own little corner of it, and I seem to find it so impossible to do that. Mr. Sales fan had spent itself again, and his voice was tender and grave. Let my wife sometimes forget that he who made the world, and who will remake it in his own good time, can look after the lamps in the little corners also, and so that she tries to do her own little bit of a part, cannot she trust the result of her sincere doing with him also, without attempting to lift any of the burden that he has promised to carry? Dell at this point slipped softly and silently from the room. This was one of the times when there was no need of a third party. It was in sentences such as these that the true manly character of her host came to the surface and deepened her respect for him. They were not unusual sentiments coming from his lips. There was nothing in them to surprise Dell. She had never known Mr. Sales before Grace had wrought its change on his heart in life. Doctor and Mrs. Douglas often looked on in silent astonishment at the transformation of this once frivolous, worse than useless life. But to Dell her host had never been other than the earnest, faithful, working Christian that she saw him now. So she went out from them and left them alone. She had often done so before, sometimes with an unconscious touch of sadness in the act when the thought came home to her with special force that there were times when all her dearest friends were sufficient to each other and that she really was not needed anywhere. There was none of that feeling on the evening in question. She went out and stood on the piazza, and as the low murmur of Mr. and Mrs. Sales' voices came to her from time to time, she bestowed sundry little loving pats on a letter in her pocket and thought with a happy smile of one place where she really was particularly needed. While this family were particularly busy during the next few days getting the minister moved, Jane worked with untiring energy and patience. Was it to prove her penitence, or was it an outburst of her satisfaction over the turn of affairs, for mistress chose to think the former. Mrs. Arnold's tongue was busy also, her new idea fairly haunted her. She gave it utterance wherever she went until Mr. Tresavant found, much to his surprise, that he was a martyr to principle. In truth the poor man had been thinking, ever since he came to himself, that he was a martyr to his wife or his temper or something. He actually shivered when he paused long enough in his work of packing to look around his beautiful rooms, beautiful even in their confused and partially dismantled condition, and remembered for what he was leaving them. But when this new phase of the case came to his ears, after a little bewildering turning over of the matter in his own mind, he accepted the situation, and twenty-four hours thereafter you could really have found it difficult to convince him that his main, nay, his sole reason for all this bustle, was not because of certain new ideas of his in regard to mingling with and gaining influence over that special class of beings who frequent hotels. There was a general calming down in the sales household after the bustle of removal was over, and things had settled into their proper places. Not one of the loyal hearts said aloud how nice it is to have them gone, but Dr. Douglas and his wife came oftener and stayed longer, and Mr. Sales' tones took on a light-heartedness that his wife had missed, and Jane was the very personification of beaming satisfaction. The first Sabbath thereafter was beautiful with summer glory. The Regent Street Church was duly filled with worshipers, among them Mr. Sales' family. Dell's face was unusually grave. In truth Dell's heart was sad during these days. To the joy and brightness that had come to crown her life there had crept a solemn sense of her unfitness, of the standing still that there had been about the summer, of the little that she had done for the Master beside the much that she had intended. Happy she had been joyous, but it seemed to her not helpful. She tried to give attention to the sermon, indeed it was the solemn ring of the text that had set her heart to throbbing out its sense of unprofitableness. Just one thing I do, announced the preacher, and Dell's heart had murmured, Ah no I don't, I profess to, before God and men I have pronounced it the one great thing, before which all others must give way, in which all others must be absorbed. Yet in my life I have said, there are a hundred things of equal importance I will do them first. Very sadly, very humbly, she realized this as her position with God, a person of many aims, many excellent intentions, working out very few of them, working out none of them with the singleness of heart and life which characterized the noble old hero who had made these words of his the aim of his life. But there was that in Dell's nature which always made a quick rebound. She lingered but a little in the valley, forgetting the things which are behind, said the hero of old. Could she do better than to follow his words? Preacher were shortcomings and neglects, being sorry because of them, bringing her sorrow to the great burden-bearer. Could she do better than to put it from her now and gird the armor anew? Such at least was her nature. So she turned her thoughts to the sermon, if perchance that would give her a fresh impetus. But alas the preacher of the present day occupied his precious half hour of time in glorifying that grand old saint who had been in heaven for hundreds and hundreds of years, and needed not the poor little crown of laurel that earthly eloquence could weave for him, he who had won the crown of glory in his father's house so many, many years. If only the preacher of today could use Paul's words, as surely he would have wished them used as incentives to present higher life and holier attainments, leaving him to rest in his blessed heaven, how useful could he be? But Mr. Trecevant went back over the life of St. Paul, reveled in it, waxed eloquent over it, stopping not once to ask, Brother Christian, are you striving thus to live? Del presently gave up her effort to follow out the sermon. It was a grand life, it was worthy of eulogy. But her heart sought for something that morning which would lift her personally nearer to the great source of all such holy living. So she went back to the text, this one thing I do. Did she make this her motto? This wonderful man that the preacher was exalting to such a pinnacle of glory had himself sobbed out, for the good that I would I do not, but the evil which I would not, that I do. O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Not a word said Mr. Trecevant of this. His hero for the day had gone up above the clouds and storms. He did not sound like a man, rather like some powerful angel, but some way it comforted Del's sin-stained heart to go back to those words of pitiful confession, the good that I would I do not. Here at least she and Paul the sinner met on common ground. And she remembered, just then, with a thrill of thanksgiving, that the same voice had exclaimed in triumph, I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. He had conquered not through wondrous human strength, but through Christ. Her Christ not Paul's alone, but hers. Did not she conquer too? Nay could she not make bold to reach after and lay hold of these very words, this one thing I do, I press toward the mark, working, pressing, struggling on, reaching out right and left for those about him to come to. That was St. Paul's life, through Christ which strengthened him. So it came to pass that before Mr. Trecevant had completed his funeral eulogy over the glorified saint, there had been born into Del's heart a new desire and purpose, a new determination to do with her might whatsoever. I'll take that for my motto, she said eagerly, whatsoever, then it will be in Christ's hands, and he will bring it to pass.