CHAPTER XXI
AN EFFORT FOR TRUTH
When Eloise spoke in the ravine of talking with her grandfather, it was because for a few days she had been trying to make up her mind to an interview with him. A fortnight ago she would have felt this to be impossible; but subtle changes had been going on in herself, and, she thought, in him. If her mother would undertake the interview now and take that stand with Mr. Evringham which Eloise felt that self-respect demanded, the girl would gladly escape it; but there was no prospect of such a thing. Mrs. Evringham was only too glad to benefit by her father-in-law's modified mood, to glide along the surface of things and wait—Eloise knew it, knew it every day, in moments when her cheeks flushed hot—for Dr. Ballard to throw the handkerchief.
The girl wished to talk with Mr. Evringham without her mother's knowledge, and the prospect was a dreaded ordeal. She felt that they had won his contempt, and she feared the loss of her own self-control when she should come to touch upon the sore spots.
“What would you do, Jewel,” she asked the next morning, after they had read the lesson; “what would you do if you were afraid of somebody?”
“I wouldn't be,” returned the child quickly.
“Well, I am. Now what am I going to do about it?”
Anna Belle, who always gave unwinking attention to the lesson, was in Jewel's lap, and the child twisted out the in-turning morocco foot as she spoke.
“Why, I'd know that one thought of God couldn't be afraid of another,” she replied in the conclusive tone to which Eloise could never grow accustomed.
“Oh, Jewel, child,” the girl said impatiently, “we'd be sorry to think most of the people we know are thoughts of God.”
“That's because you get the error man mixed up with the real one. Mother explains that to me when we ride in cable cars and places where we see error people with sorry faces. There's a real man, a real thought of God, behind every one of them; and when you remember to think right about people every minute, you are doing them good. Did you say you're afraid of somebody?”
“Yes, and that somebody is a man whom I must talk to.”
“Then begin right away to know every minute that the real man isn't anybody to be afraid of, for God made him, and God has only loving thoughts; and of course you must be loving all the time. It'll be just as easy by the time you come to it, cousin Eloise!”
The girl often asked herself in these days why she should begin to feel unreasonably hopeful and lighter hearted. Her mother no longer complained of her moods. Mrs. Evringham laid the becoming change in her daughter's expression to the girl's happiness in discovering that she did reciprocate Dr. Ballard's evident sentiments.
“Eloise is so high minded,” thought the mother complacently. “She would never be satisfied to marry for convenience, like so many;” and considering herself passingly astute, she let well enough alone, ceased to bring the physician's name into every conversation, and bided her time.
One morning Mr. Evringham, coming out of the house to go to town, met Eloise on the piazza.
“You are down early,” he said as he greeted her, and was passing on to the carriage.
“Just one minute, grandfather!” she exclaimed, and how her heart beat. He turned his erect form in some surprise, and his cold eyes met the girlish ones.
“She's a stunning creature,” he thought, as the sunlight bathed her young beauty; but his face was impenetrable, and Eloise nerved herself.
“Were you thinking of going golfing this afternoon?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“I thought you said something about it at dinner last evening. Would you let me go with you?”
Mr. Evringham, much astonished, raised his eyebrows and took off the hat which he had replaced.
“Such a request from youth and beauty is a command,” he returned with a slight bow.
Tears sprang to the girl's eyes. “Don't make fun of me, grandfather!” she exclaimed impulsively.
“Not for worlds,” he returned. “You will do the laughing when you see me drive. My hand seems to have lost its cunning this spring. Shall we say four-thirty? Very well. Good-morning.”
“Now what's all this?” mused Mr. Evringham as he drove to the station. “Has another granddaughter fallen in love with me? Methinks not. What is she after? Does she want to get away from Ballard? Methinks not, again. She's going to ask me for something probably. Egad, if she does, I think I'll turn her over to Jewel.”
Eloise's eyes were bright during the lesson that morning.
“It's to-day, Jewel,” she said, “that I'm going to talk with that man I'm afraid of.”
“Never say that again,” returned the child vehemently. “You are not afraid. There's no one to be afraid of. Do you want me to handle it for you?”
“What do you mean, Jewel?”
“To declare the truth for you.”
“Do you mean give me a treatment for it?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Do you know that seems very funny to me, Jewel?”
“It seems funny to me that you are afraid, when God made you, and the man, and all of us, and there's nothing but goodness and love in the universe. Fear is the belief of evil. Do you want to believe evil?”
“No, I hate to,” returned Eloise promptly.
“Then you go away, cousin Eloise, and I will handle the case for you.”
“Oh, are you going golfing?” said Mrs. Evringham that afternoon to her daughter. “Do put on your white duck, dear.”
“Yes, I intend to. I'm going with grandfather.”
“You are?” in extremest surprise. “Oh, wear your dark skirt, dear; it's plenty good enough. Do you mean to say he asked you, Eloise?”
“No, I asked him.”
Mrs. Evringham stood in silent amaze, her brain working alertly. She even watched her daughter don the immaculate white golf suit, and made no further protest.
What was in the girl's mind? When finally from her window she saw the two enter the brougham, Mr. Evringham carrying his granddaughter's clubs, she smiled a knowing smile and nodded her head.
“I do believe I've wronged Eloise,” she thought. “How foolish it was to worry. I've been wondering how in the world I was going to get father to give her a wedding, and how I was going to get her to accept it, and now look! That child has thought of the same thing, and will manage it a hundred times better than I could.”
Jewel stood on the steps and waved her hand as the brougham rolled away. Eloise had seized and squeezed her surreptitiously in the hall before they came out.
“I do feel braced up, Jewel. Thank you,” she whispered hurriedly.
“Is the man over at the golf links?” asked the child, surprised to see that Eloise and her grandfather were going out together.
“He will be by the time I get there,” returned the girl.
As soon as the carriage door had closed and they had started, Eloise spoke. “You must think it very strange that I asked this of you, grandfather.”
There was a hint of violets clinging to the fresh white garments that brushed Mr. Evringham's knee.
“I would not question the gifts the gods provide;” he returned.
She seemed able to rise above the fear of his sarcasms. “Not that you would be surprised at anything mother or I might ask of you,” she continued bravely, “but I have suffered, I'm sure, as much as you have during the last two months.”
“Indeed? I regret to hear that.”
If there was a sting in this reply, Eloise refused to recognize it.
“In fact I have felt so much that it has made it impossible hitherto to say anything, but Jewel has given me courage.”
Mr. Evringham smoothed his mustache. “She has plenty to spare,” he returned.
“She says,” went on Eloise, “that everything that isn't love is hate; and hate, of course, in her category is unreal. It is because I want the real things, because I long for real things, for truth, that I asked to have this talk, grandfather, and I wanted to be quite alone with you, so I thought of this way.”
“It's the mater she's running away from, then,” reflected her companion. He nodded courteously. “I am at your disposal,” he returned.
Subtly the broker's feeling toward Eloise had been changing since the evening in which Jewel wrote to her parents. His hard and fast opinion of her had been slightly shaken. The frankness of her remarks on Christian Science in the presence of Dr. Ballard the other evening had been a surprise to him. The cold, proud, noncommittal, ease-loving girl who in his opinion had decided to marry the young doctor was either less designing than he had believed, or else wonderfully certain of her own power to hold him. He found himself regarding her with new interest.
“I've been waiting for mother to talk with you,” she went on, “and clear up our position; but she does not, and so I must.” The speaker's hands were tightly clasped in her lap. “I wish I had Jewel's unconsciousness, her certainty that all is Good, for I feel—I feel shame before you, grandfather.”
It seemed to Mr. Evringham that Jewel's eyes were appealing to him.
“She says,” he returned with a rather grim smile, “Jewel avers that I am kindness itself inside. Let us admit it for convenience now, and see if you can't speak freely.”
“Thank you. You know what I am ashamed of: staying here so long; imposing upon you; taking everything for granted when we have no right. I want to understand our affairs; to know if we have anything, and what it is; to have you help me, you; to have you tell me how we can live independently, and help me to make mother agree to it. Oh, if you would—if you could be my friend, grandfather. I need you so!”
Mr. Evringham received this impetuous outburst without change of countenance. “How about Ballard?” he said. “I thought he was going to settle all this.”
There was silence in the brougham. The flash of hurt in the girl's eyes was quenched by quick tears. Her companion reddened under the look of surprise she bent upon him, her lovely lips unsteady.
“No offense,” he added hastily. “Ballard's sentiments are evident enough, and he is a fine fellow.”
Eloise controlled herself. “Will you take the trouble to explain our affairs to me?” she asked.
“Certainly,” responded Mr. Evringham quickly. “I wish for your sake there was more to explain, more possibilities in the case.”
“We have nothing?” exclaimed the girl acutely.
“Your father took heavy chances and lost. His affairs are nearly settled, and what there is left is small indeed.” The speaker cast a quick glance at the girl beside him. She had caught her lip between her teeth. Jewel's soft voice sounded in his ears. “Cousin Eloise feels sorry because she isn't your real relation.” An inkling of what the girl might suffer came to him.
“Your mother and you have a claim upon me,” he went on. “I should certainly feel a responsibility of all my son's debts, and the one to his wife and daughter in particular. I will try to make the situation easier for you in some way.”
“Manage for us to go away, grandfather. Haven't you a little house somewhere?”
The beseeching in her tone surprised Mr. Evringham still more. What did the girl mean? Didn't she intend to marry Ballard? He had believed her to be planning to preside in the Mountain Avenue mansion.
“Yes, it can be arranged, certainly,” he answered vaguely; “but there's no hurry, Eloise,” he added, in the kindest tone he had ever used toward her. “Some evening we will go over the affairs, and I will show you where your mother stands financially, and we will try to make some plan that shall be satisfactory.”
Eloise gave him a grateful look, as much in response to his manner as to his words. “Thank you. The present condition is certainly—error,” she said.
“Well, we'll try to find harmony,” replied the other. “Jewel would say it was easy. I should like to have you remain at my house at least as long as she does, Eloise. I should probably have to tie her hair ribbons again if you went.”
The two found themselves smiling at each other. The atmosphere was lightened, and the brougham drew up at the clubhouse.
Mr. Evringham handed out the girl, gave Zeke the order to return for them, and they went up the steps.
“I would drive back with him, grandfather, only that mother would wonder, and ask questions,” said Eloise. “Don't let me detain you in any way. I'll just sit here on the piazza.”
“Not play? Nonsense!” returned Mr. Evringham brusquely.
“Please don't feel obliged”—Eloise began humbly.
“But I can't help being obliged if you'll play with me,” interrupted her companion.
Some men observed the confidential attitude of the broker and the beautiful girl. “What's doing over there?” asked one. “Is Evringham beginning to take notice?”
“Why, don't you know?” returned the other. “That's his granddaughter.”
“His daughter, do you mean? Didn't know he had one.”
“Not a bit of it. She's Lawrence's stepdaughter.”
The other shook his head. “That's too involved for me. She's a queen, anyway.”
“Going to marry Ballard, they say.”
“That so? Then I won't go up and fall on Evringham's neck. My bank book isn't in Ballard's class. She can play, too,” as he observed Eloise make a drive while she waited the reappearance of her companion from the clubhouse. “Isn't that a bird!—and say, there's young Lochinvar himself!” for here a light automobile whizzed briskly up to the clubhouse.
Dr. Ballard sprang out, for he had recognized the figure at the first teeing ground.
“You gave me the slip!” he cried as he approached.
“Oh, I just went with a handsomer man,” returned Eloise, smiling, as they shook hands.
“I didn't know I could come until the last minute, then I went to the house for you and found I had missed you.”
Mr. Evringham and the caddy approached. “I cut you out for once, Ballard,” he said. “Well, we're off, Eloise. I saw you drive. I doubt if he catches us.”
Jewel's eyes questioned Eloise that evening when she reached home, and she received the smiling, significant nod her cousin gave her with satisfaction.
It was an apparently united family party that gathered about the dinner table. Mr. Evringham and Eloise discussed their game, while Mrs. Evringham fairly rustled with complacence.
As Jewel clung to her grandfather's neck that evening in bidding him good-night, she whispered:—
“How happy we all are!”
“Are we, really? Well now, that's very gratifying, I'm sure. Good-night, Jewel.”
CHAPTER XXII
IN THE HARNESS ROOM
“Mother, can I have three dollars?” asked Eloise the next morning.
“Were you thinking of a new riding hat, dear? I do wish you had it to wear this afternoon. Yours is shabby, certainly, but you can't get it for that, child.”
“No; I was thinking of a copy of 'Science and Health.' I don't like to take Jewel's any longer, and I'm convinced.”
“What of—sin?” asked Mrs. Evringham in dismay.
“No, just the opposite—that there needn't be any. The book teaches the truth. I know it.”
“Well, whether it does or doesn't, you haven't any three dollars to spend for a book, Eloise,” was the firm reply. “The idea, when I can barely rake and scrape enough together to keep us presentable!”
“Where do you get our money?” asked the girl.
“Father gives me a check every fortnight. Of course you know that he has charge of our affairs.”
Eloise's serene expression did not change. She looked at the little black book in her hand. “This edition costs five dollars,” she said.
“Scandalous!” exclaimed Mrs. Evringham. “I can tell you this is no time for us to be collecting editions de luxe. Wait till you're married.”
“I'm going to run in town for a while this morning, mother.”
“You are? Well don't get belated. You know that you are to ride with Dr. Ballard at half past four. Dear me,” her brow drawn, “you ought to have that hat. Now I think that I could get on without that jet bolero.”
Eloise laughed softly and drew her mother to her. “Have your jet bolero, dear,” she answered. “My hat isn't bad.”
Eloise went to her room, and closing the door, took from one of her drawers a box. It contained her girlish treasures, the ornaments and jewels her father had given her from time to time. She took out a small diamond ring and pressed it to her lips.
“Dear papa! I love it because you gave it to me, but I can get with it a wonderful thing, a truth which, if we had known it, would have saved you all those torturing hours, would have saved your dear life. I know how gladly you would have me get it now, for you are learning it too; and it will be your gift, dear, dear papa, your gift just the same.”
Jewel had to study the lesson with only Anna Belle's assistance that morning, but she received the third letter from her mother and father. Their trip was proving a success from the standpoints of both business and pleasure, but their chief longing was to get back to their little girl.
It was very like visiting with them to read it over, and Jewel did so more than once. “I'll show it to cousin Eloise as soon as she comes home,” she reflected. Then she dressed Anna Belle to go out.
Running downstairs the child sought and found Mrs. Forbes in the kitchen. The housekeeper no longer questioned her going and coming, although she still considered herself in the light of the child's only disciplinarian, and was vigilant to watch for errors of omission and commission, and quick to correct them.
“Mrs. Forbes, may I have an old kitchen knife?”
“Certainly not. You'll cut yourself.”
“I want it to dig up plants.”
Mrs. Forbes stared down at her. “Why, you mustn't do any such thing.”
“I mean wild flowers for a garden that Anna Belle and I are going to make.”
“Oh. I'll see if I can't find you a trowel.”
There was one at hand, and as the housekeeper passed it to the child she warned her:—
“Be careful you don't make a mistake, now, and get hold of anybody's plants. What did your cousin Eloise go to New York for?”
“I don't know.”
“Well I hope it's for her trousseau.”
Jewel smiled. “My mother makes those.”
“I don't believe she'll ever make one for you, then,” returned Mrs. Forbes, but not ill-naturedly. She laughed, glancing at Sarah, who stood by.
“But I think she will for Anna Belle,” returned Jewel brightly, “when she gets older.”
The housekeeper and maid both laughed. “Run along,” said Mrs. Forbes, “and don't you be late for lunch.”
“She's an awful sweet child,” said Sarah half reproachfully. “Just the spirit of sunshine.”
“Oh well, they'd turn her head here if it wasn't for me,” answered the other complacently.
Jewel was not late to lunch, but eating it tete-a-tete with aunt Madge was not to her taste.
Mrs. Evringham utilized the opportunity to admonish her, and Mrs. Forbes for once sympathized with the widow's sentiments.
Aunt Madge took off her eyeglasses in a way she had when she wished to be particularly impressive.
“Jewel,” she said, “I don't think any one has told you that it is impolite to Dr. Ballard to say anything about Christian Science in his presence.”
“Why is it?” asked the child.
“Because he is a learned physician, and has, of course, a great respect for his profession.”
“I have a great respect for him,” returned the child, “and he knows I wouldn't hurt his feelings.”
“The idea!” exclaimed Mrs. Evringham, looking down from a height upon the flaxen head. “As if a little ignorant girl could hurt the feelings of a man like Dr. Ballard!”
Mrs. Forbes also stared at the child, and she winced.
“I do love them, and they do love me,” she thought. “I don't remember ever speaking about it before the doctor unless somebody asked me,” she said aloud.
“Your cousin Eloise may ask you,” returned Mrs. Evringham. “Nobody else would. She does it in a spirit of mischief, perhaps, but I shall speak to her. She has a passing curiosity about your ideas because it is odd and rather amusing to find a child who has such unnatural and precocious fancies, and she tries to draw you out; but it will not last with her. Neither will it with you, probably. You seem to be a sensible little girl in many ways.” Mrs. Evringham made the addition magnanimously. She really was too much at peace with all the world just now to like to be severe.
Outwardly Jewel was silent. Inwardly she was declaring many things which would have surprised her companions.
“Does your cousin Eloise pretend to you that she is becoming seriously interested in your faith?” pursued Mrs. Evringham.
“She will tell you all about it,” returned Jewel.
Aunt Madge shrugged her shoulders and laughed a little. Her thoughts reverted to her daughter's trip to the city. She had wondered several times if it had any pleasant connection with her sudden good understanding with Mr. Evringham.
To Jewel's relief her thoughts remained preoccupied during the remainder of the meal; and as soon as the child could leave, she flew to the closet under the stairs, where Anna Belle often went into retreat during the luncheon hour, and from thence back to the garden she was making by the brookside.
When she returned to the house her eyes lighted as she saw two horses before the piazza, and Dr. Ballard standing beside one of them.
“How are you, Jewel?” he asked, as she danced up to him smiling. Stooping, he lifted her into the side saddle, from whence she beamed upon him.
“Oh, what fun you're going to have!” she cried.
“I'd like to be sure of that,” he answered, his gloved hand on the pommel.
“What do you mean?” incredulously. “You don't like that automobile better, do you? They're so—so stubby. I must have a horse, a horse!” She smoothed and patted her steed lovingly.
“You ought to have—Jewel of the world,” he said kindly. “My bad angel!” he added, looking up quizzically into her eyes, and smiling at the widening wonder that grew in them.
“Your—what?” she asked, and then Eloise came out in her habit.
“I'm going instead of you,” cried the child gayly, “to pay you for staying away all day.”
“Did you miss me?” asked the girl as she shook hands with her escort.
“I tried not to. Anna Belle and I have something to show you in the ravine.” As she spoke, Jewel slid down into the doctor's arms, and stood on the steps watching while he put Eloise up and mounted himself.
The child's eyes dwelt upon the pair admiringly as they waved their hands to her and rode away. Little she knew how their hearts were beating. Mrs. Evringham, watching from an upper window, suspected it. She felt that this afternoon would end all suspense.
The child gave a wistful sigh as the horses disappeared, and jumping off the piazza, she wandered around the house toward the stable. There had been no rules laid down to her since the night of Essex Maid's attack, and Zeke was always a congenial companion.
As she neared the barn a young fellow left it, laughing. She knew who he was,—one of the young men Zeke had known in Boston. He had several times of late come to call on his old chum, for he was out of work.
As he left the barn he saw the child and slouched off to one side, avoiding her; but she scarcely noticed him, congratulating herself that Zeke would be alone and ready, as usual, to crack jokes and stories.
The coachman was not in sight as she entered, but she knew she would find him in the harness room. Its door stood ajar, and as the child approached she heard a strange sound, as of some one weeping suppressedly. Sturdily resisting the sudden fear that swept to her heart, she pushed open the door.
There stood Mrs. Forbes, leaning against a wooden support, her forehead resting against her clasped hands in a hopeless posture, as she sobbed heavily. The air was filled with an odor which had for Jewel sickening associations. The only terror, the only tragedy, of her short life was wrapped about with this pungent smell. She seemed again to hear her mother's sobs, to feel once more that sensation of all things coming to ruin which descended upon her at the unprecedented sight and sound of her strong mother's emotion.
All at once she perceived Zeke sitting on a low chair, his arms hanging across his knees and his head fallen.
The child turned very pale. Her doll slid unnoticed to the floor, as she pressed her little hands to her eyes.
“Father, Mother, God,” she murmured in gasps. “Thou art all power. We are thy children. Error has no power over us. Help us to waken from this lie.”
Running up to the housekeeper, she clasped her arms about her convulsed form. “Dear Mrs. Forbes,” she said, her soft voice trembling at first but growing firm, “I know this claim, but it can be healed. It seems very terrible, but it's nothing. We know it, we must know it.”
The woman lifted her head and looked down with swollen eyes upon the child. She saw her go unhesitatingly across to Zeke and kneel beside him.
“Don't be discouraged, Zeke,” she said lovingly. “I know how it seems, but my father had it and he was healed. You will be healed.”
The coachman lifted his rumpled head and stared at her with bloodshot eyes.
“Great fuss 'bout nothing,” he said sullenly. “Mother always fussing.”
Something in his look made the child shudder. Resisting the sudden repugnance to one who had always shown her kindness, she impulsively took his big hand in both her little ones. “Zeke, what is error saying to you?” she demanded. “You can't look at me without love. I love you because God does. He is lifting us out of this error belief.”
The young fellow returned the clasp of the soft hands and winked his eyes like one who is waking. “Mother makes great fuss,” he grumbled. “Scott was here. We had two or three little friendly drinks. Ma had to come in and blubber.”
“What friendly drinks? What do you mean?” demanded Jewel, looking all about her. Her eyes fell upon a large black bottle. She dropped the coachman's hand and picked it up. She smelled of it, her eyes dilated, and she began to tremble again; and throwing the whiskey from her, she buried her face for a moment against Zeke's shirt sleeve.
“Is it in a bottle!” she exclaimed at last, in a hushed voice, drawing back and regarding the coachman with such a white and horrified countenance that it frightened the clouds from his brain. “Is that terrible claim in a bottle, and do people drink it out?” she asked slowly, and in an awestruck tone.
“It's no harm,” began Zeke.
“No harm when your mother is crying, when your face is full of error, and your eyes were hating? No harm when my mother cried, and all our gladness was gone? Would you go and drink a claim like that out of a bottle—of your own accord?”
Zeke wriggled under the blue eyes and the unnatural rigidity of the child's face.
“No, Jewel, he wouldn't,” groaned Mrs. Forbes suddenly. “Zeke's a good boy, but he's inherited that. His father died of it. It's a disease, child. I thought my boy would escape, but he hasn't! It's the end!” cried the wretched woman. “What will Mr. Evringham say! To think how I blamed Fanshaw! Zeke'll lose his place and go downhill, and I shall die of shame and despair.” Her sobs again shook her from head to foot.
Jewel continued to look at Zeke. A new, eager expression stole over her face. “Is it the end?” she asked. “Don't you believe in God?”
“I suppose so,” answered the coachman sullenly. “I know I'm a man, too. I can control myself.”
“No. Nobody can. Even Jesus said, 'Of myself I can do nothing.' Only God can help you. If you can drink that nasty smelling stuff, and get all red and rumply and sorry, then you need God the worst of anybody in Bel-Air. You look better now. It's just like a dream, the way you lifted up your face to me when I came in, and it was a dream. I'll help you, Zeke. I'll show you how to find help.” The child suddenly leaned toward the young fellow, and then retreated. “I can't stand your breath!” she exclaimed, “and I like to get close to the people I love.”
This seemed to touch Zeke. He blushed hotly. “It's a darned shame, kid,” he returned sheepishly.
“Mrs. Forbes, come here, please,” said Jewel. The housekeeper had ceased crying, and was watching the pair. She saw that her boy's senses were clearer. She approached obediently, and when the child took her hand her own closed tightly upon the little fingers.
“Zeke, you're a big strong man and everybody likes you,” said Jewel earnestly. “Isn't it better to stay that way than to drink out of a bottle, no matter how much you like it?”
“I don't like it so awfully,” returned Zeke protestingly. “I like to be sociable with the boys, that's all.”
“What a way to be sociable!” gasped the child. “Well, wouldn't you rather be nice, so people will like to get close to you?”
“Depends on the folks,” returned the boy with a touch of his usual manner. “You're all right, little kid.” He put out his hand, but quickly withdrew it.
Jewel seized it. “Now give your other one to your mother. There now, we're all together. If your mother thinks you have a disease, Zeke, then she must know you haven't. If you want me to, I'll come out here every day at a quiet time and give you a treatment, and we'll talk all about Christian Science, and we'll know that there's nothing that can make us sick or unhappy—or unkind! Think of your unkindness to your mother—and to me if you go on, for I love you, Zeke. Now may I help you?”
The soft frank voice, the earnest little face, moved Zeke to cast a glance at his mother's swollen eyes. They were bent upon Jewel.
“Do you say your father was cured that way, child?” asked Mrs. Forbes.
“Yes. Oh yes! and he's so happy!”
“Zeke, let's all be thankful if there's anything,” said the woman tremulously, turning to him appealingly.
“I'd just as soon have a visit from you every day, little kid,” said the young fellow. “You're a corker.”
“But you must want more than me,” returned the child. “God and healing and purity and goodness! If you're in earnest, what are you going to do with that?” She touched the black bottle with the toe of her shoe.
Zeke looked at the whiskey, then back into her eyes. They were full of love and faith for him.
He stooped and picked up the bottle, then striding to a window, he flung it out toward the forest trees with all the force of his strong arm.
“Damn the stuff!” he said.
Mrs. Forbes felt herself tremble from head to foot. She bit her lip.
Her son turned back. “Getting near train time,” he added, not looking at his companions. “Guess I'll go upstairs.”
When he had disappeared his mother stooped slowly and kissed Jewel. “Forgive me,” she said tremulously.
“What for?” asked the child.
“Everything.”
The housekeeper still stood in the harness room after Jewel had gone away. She bowed her head on her folded hands. “Our Father who art in heaven, forgive me,” she prayed. “Forgive me for being a fool. Forgive me for not recognizing Thine angel whom Thou hast sent. Amen.”
CHAPTER XXIII
MRS. EVRINGHAM'S CALLER
Mrs. Evringham was busily chewing the cud of sweet fancies only, that afternoon. Following the equestrians in their leafy woodland path, she pictured them as talking of their future, and herself built many castles in the air. “Ah,” she thought sentimentally, leaning back in her reclining chair, “how charming is youth—with plenty of money!”
She was roused from these luxurious meditations by the appearance of Sarah, bearing a card on a salver.
“A man!” she exclaimed with annoyance. “I'm not dressed.”
Lifting the card, she read it with a start.
“Mr. Nathan Wycliffe Bonnell.”
“Tell him I'll be down soon,” was all she said; but her thoughts ran swiftly as she hurriedly slipped into her gown. “How in the world comes the boy out here? Just as well that Eloise is away. It would only be painful to her, all the old associations.” But old associations cropped up more and more enticingly for Mrs. Evringham as she made her swift toilet, and by the time she reached the drawing-room her eagerness lent her cordiality a very genuine tone.
“Nat, dear boy, how are you?”
The young man who rose eagerly to meet her would have been noticeable in any crowd. She gazed up into his smooth-shaven, frank face, with its alert eyes and strong chin, and felt a yearning affection for all which he represented to her. “What are you doing out here?”
“Visiting you and Eloise,” he answered, with the hearty relish which always characterized his manner when circumstances were agreeable. “Where is she?”
“Riding. I don't know when they will come home, either. It's such a charming day, isn't it? So good of you to hunt us up, Nat. We've been out of the world so long. I can't tell you what a rush of memories comes over me at sight of you, you nice, big boy. I do believe you've been growing.” She gave a glance of approval at the young man's stalwart proportions.
“Oh, don't humiliate me,” he laughed, as she drew him to a divan, where they seated themselves.
“How could you get away at this hour?”
“I'm changing my business, and get a week's vacation thereby. Great luck, isn't it?”
“I hope so. Are you going to do better?”
“Much better. It's only a little matter of time now, Mrs. Evringham—automobiles, steam yachts, and all the rest of it.”
“Ah, the optimism of youth!” she sighed, gazing at the dancing lights in his eyes. “It's very beautiful, and usually entirely unfounded. You look so radiant, my dear. Perhaps you have come out here to let us congratulate you. Have you found that desirable girl? I certainly should be the first to be told, for I always talked to you very plainly, didn't I?”
“Indeed you did, Mrs. Evringham. You always kept my ineligibility before me strenuously.”
“A certain sort of ineligibility, dear boy,” returned the lady with a flattering cadence. “Your capital did not happen to consist of money. Tell me all, Nat. Who is she?”
He shook his head. “She's still not impossible, but improbable,” he returned.
“Oh, you are too difficult, my dear. Really, I thought at the time our misfortunes fell upon us that it was going to be Miss Caton. She would have been a great assistance to you, Nat. It isn't as if you could even afford to be a bachelor. In these days so much is expected of them. How is your mother?” Mrs. Evringham made the addition in that tone of fixed sympathy which one employs when only a depressing answer can be expected.
“Very well, thank you.”
“You mean as well as usual, I suppose.”
“No, I mean well. Wonderful, isn't it?”
“Really, Nat?” Mrs. Evringham straightened up in her interest. “Who did it?”
“She was healed by Christian Science.”
“You don't mean it!”
“Indeed I do.”
Mrs. Evringham thanked her holy stars that Eloise was absent.
“Well! I never for one moment classed your mother as a malade imaginaire!” exclaimed the lady.
Her companion raised his eyebrows. “I fancy no one did who knew her.”
“You believe it, then?”
“I should be an idiot if I didn't.”
“Do you mean to say she is out of her wheeled chair?”
“No chairs for her now. When she wishes to walk she walks.”
“Then she always could!” declared Mrs. Evringham.
“I think you know better than that,” returned the other calmly.
“How long since?” asked Mrs. Evringham.
“Three months.”
Silence.
“Aren't you glad for her?” asked Bonnell with a slight smile of curiosity into the disturbed face. “I ought to have told you at first that osteopathy did it; then after your joy had subsided, break the truth gently.”
“Of course I'm glad,” returned the other stiffly, “but I'd rather Eloise did not hear of it at once.”
“May I know why?”
“Certainly. We have a very dear friend who is a physician. It looks very much as if he might be something nearer than a friend. It is he with whom Eloise is riding this afternoon. It is very distasteful, naturally, to have these alleged cures discussed in our family. We have had some annoyance in that line already. You can understand how doctors must feel.”
“Yes, so long as they believe a cure to be only alleged; but where one is convinced that previously hopeless conditions have been healed, and it does happen once in a while, they are glad of it, I'm confident. We haven't a finer, broader minded class of men in our country than our physicians.”
“I think so,” agreed Mrs. Evringham, drawing herself up with a fleeting vision of the Ballard place on Mountain Avenue.
“But they are not the wealthiest at the start,” said Nat. “Is it possible that you are allowing Eloise to ride unchaperoned with a young physician?”
Mrs. Evringham did not remark the threatening curves at the corners of the speaker's lips.
“Oh, this one is different,” she returned seriously; “very fine connections, and substantial in every way.”
Her companion threw back his head and laughed frankly.
“We have to smile at each other once in a while, don't we, Mrs. Evringham?” he said, in the light, caressing manner which had for a few years been one of her chief worries; “but all the same, you're fond of me just as long as I don't forget my place, eh? You're glad to see me?”
“You know I am.” Mrs. Evringham pressed her hand against the laces over her heart. “Such a bittersweet feeling comes over me at the very tones of your voice. Oh, the happy past, Nat! Gone forever!” She touched a dainty handkerchief to her eyes. “I suppose your mother is still in her apartment?”
“She has taken a place at View Point for the summer, and has set her heart on a long visit from you.”
“How very kind of her,” responded Mrs. Evringham with genuine gratitude. “I don't know what father means to do in the hot weather or whether he—or whether I should wish to go with him. Your mother and I always enjoyed each other, when she was sufficiently free from suffering.”
“That time is always now,” returned Nat, a fullness of gratitude in his voice.
His companion looked at him curiously. “I can't realize it.”
“Come and see,” was his reply.
“I will, I certainly will. I shall anticipate it with great pleasure.”
A very convenient place to prepare a part of Eloise's trousseau, Mrs. Evringham was considering, and the girl safely engaged, Nat's presence would have no terrors. “You think you are really getting into a good business arrangement now?” she asked aloud.
“Very. I wake up in the morning wondering at my own good fortune.”
“I am so glad, my dear boy,” responded the other sympathetically. “Perhaps, after all, you will be able to wait for a little more chin than Miss Caton has. Of course she's a very nice girl and all that.”
Bonnell smiled at the carpet.
They talked on for half an hour of mutual friends over cups of tea, and then he rose to go.
“Eloise will be sorry!” said Mrs. Evringham effusively. “It's such a long way out here and so difficult for you to get the time. It isn't as if you could come easily.”
“Oh, I have several days here. I'm staying at the Reeves's. Do you know them?”
“No,” returned the lady, trying to conceal that this was a blow.
“It is Mr. Reeves with whom I am going into business, and we are doing some preliminary work. I shall see Eloise soon. Remember me to her.”
“Yes, certainly,” replied Mrs. Evringham. She kept a stiff upper lip until she was alone, and then a troubled line grew in her forehead.
“It will be all right, of course, if things are settled,” she thought. “I can scarcely wait for Eloise to come home.”
Jewel had come from the barn straight to her room, where she thought upon her problem with the aids she loved.
At last she went downstairs to a side door to watch for Zeke as he drove from the barn on his way to the station to meet Mr. Evringham. As the horse walked out of the barn she emerged and intercepted the coachman.
Mrs. Forbes at a window saw Zeke stop. She wondered what Jewel was saying to him, wondered with a humble gratitude novel to her dominating nature.
“Wait one minute, Zeke,” said the child. “I've been wondering whether I ought to say anything to grandpa.”
“If you do I'll lose my place,” returned the young fellow; “and I've never done wrong by the horses yet.”
“I know you haven't. God has taken care of you, hasn't he, Zeke? Do you think it's right for me not to tell grandpa? I've decided that I'll do whatever you say.”
It was the wisdom of the serpent and the harmlessness of the dove. Zeke, nervously fingering the whip handle, looked down into the guileless face and mentally vowed never to betray the trust he saw there.
“Then don't tell him, Jewel,” he returned rather thickly, for the fullness in his throat. “You come out to the barn the way you said you would, and we'll talk over things. I don't care if the boys do laugh. I've sworn off. I believe you helped Essex Maid the other night. I believe you can help me.”
Jewel's eyes were joyful. “If you know you want help, Zeke, then you'll get it. Mother says that's the first thing. Mortal mind is so proud.”
“Mine ain't strutting much,” returned Zeke as he drove on.
Jewel amused herself about the grounds until the phaeton should return with her grandfather.
When she saw it coming she ran down to the gate and hopped and skipped back beside it, Mr. Evringham watching her gyrations unsmilingly.
As he dismounted at the piazza she clung to his hand going up the steps. “Which are you going to do, grandpa, go riding or play golf?”
“Which do you want me to do?” he asked.
“When you ride it's more fun for me,” she replied.
He seated himself in one of the chairs and she leaned against its broad arm.
“It's rather more fun for me, too. I'm growing lazy. I think I'll ride.”
“Good!”
“What have you been doing to-day, Jewel?”
“Well,”—meditatively,—“cousin Eloise went to New York, so I had to get my lesson alone. And I didn't braid my hair over.”
Mr. Evringham looked startled. “She'll do it, I dare say, before dinner,” he replied.
“If she has time. She has gone riding with Dr. Ballard. They just trotted away together. Oh, it was lovely!”
Mr. Evringham, leaning his head back, looked off under his heavy brows as he responded:—