Jewel: A Chapter in Her Life

“and all that sort of business, I suppose.”

“I don't know what you mean,” said Jewel doubtfully.

“I should hope not. Well, what else have you done? Been treating any rheumatism? I haven't had it since the sun shone.”

“You never asked me to,” returned the child.

Mr. Evringham smiled. “The sunshine is a pretty good treatment,” he observed.

“Sometimes your belief comes into my thought,” said Jewel, “and of course I always turn on it and think the truth.”

“Much obliged, I'm sure. I'd like to turn on it myself at times.”

“You can study with cousin Eloise and me, if you'd like to,” said Jewel eagerly.

“Oh, thank you, thank you,” rejoined the broker hastily. “Don't disturb yourself. There must be some sinners, you know, or the saints would have to go out of business—nobody to practice on. Well, have you been to the ravine?”

“Oh yes! Anna Belle and I, and we had more fun! We made a garden.”

“Morning or afternoon?”

“Morning.”

“Well I wish to know,” said Mr. Evringham in a suddenly serious and impressive tone, “I wish to know if you reached home in time for lunch.”

Jewel felt somewhat startled under the daze of his piercing eyes, but her conscience was clear. “Yes, I was here in plenty of time. I wanted to surely not be late, so I was here too soon.”

“That's what I was afraid of,” returned Mr. Evringham gravely. “I don't wish you to be unpunctual, but I object equally to your returning unnecessarily early when you wish to stay.”

“But I couldn't help it, grandpa,” Jewel began earnestly, when he interrupted her.

“So I've brought you this,” he added, and took from his pocket an oblong package, sealed at each end.

The child laid her doll in the broker's lap,—he had become hardened to this indignity,—and her fingers broke the seals and slipped the paper from a morocco case.

“Push the spring in the end,” said Mr. Evringham.

She obeyed. The lid flew up and disclosed a small silver chatelaine watch. The pin was a cherub's head, its wings enameled in white, as were the back and edges of the little timepiece whose hands were busily pointing to blue figures.

Jewel gasped. “For me?”

Her grandfather smoothed his mustache. He had presented gifts to ladies before, but never with such effect.

“Grandpa, grandpa!” she exclaimed, touching the little watch in wondering delight. “See what Divine Love has sent me!”

Mr. Evringham raised his eyebrows and smiled, but he was soon assured that Love's messenger was not forgotten. He was instantly enveloped in a rapturous hug, and heroically endured the bitter of the watchcase pressing into his jugular for the sweet of the rose-leaf kisses that were assaulting his cheek like the quick reports of a tiny Gatling gun.

“See if you can wind it,” he said at last.

Jewel lifted her treasure tenderly from its velvet bed, and he showed her how to twist its stem, and then pinned it securely on the breast of her light sailor suit, where she looked down upon it in rapt admiration.

“Now then, Jewel, you have no excuse!” he said severely.

She raised her happy eyes, while her hand pressed the satin surface of her watch. “Grandpa, grandpa!” she said, sighing ecstatically, “you're such a joker!”

CHAPTER XXIV

THE RAVINE GARDEN

Mrs. Evringham tried heroically to look impassive when her daughter returned from the ride. There was barely time then to dress for dinner, and no opportunity for confidences before the meal, nor afterward until bedtime; but the look of peace and sweetness in Eloise's face could have but one significance to the mother, who believed that peace lay only in the direction upon which she had set her heart.

Mr. Evringham took coffee with them after dinner in the drawing-room, while Jewel caressed her watch, never tiring of looking at its clear face and the little second hand which traveled so steadily its tiny circuit.

Mrs. Evringham looked often toward the door, expectant of the doctor's entrance. The evening wore on and he did not come. Still Eloise's face wore the placid, restful expression. A gentle ease with her grandfather replaced her old manner.

Her mother determined to try an experiment.

“You could never guess who called to-day, Eloise,” she said suddenly.

Her daughter looked up from her coffee. “No. Who was it?”

“Nat Bonnell.”

“Really!” The girl's tone indicated great surprise, and that only. “I wish I might have seen him.”

The addition was made so calmly, almost perfunctorily, that Mrs. Evringham smiled with exultation.

She turned to her father-in-law. “Who would believe that Mr. Bonnell was Eloise's brightest flame a year ago? 'How soon are we forgot!'” she said lightly.

When Jewel had kissed them all good-night and gone upstairs, and Mr. Evringham had withdrawn to his library, Mrs. Evringham took her child's hand and looked fondly into her eyes.

“Well?” she asked.

“Well,” returned Eloise, “do tell me everything Nat said.”

“After you've told me everything Dr. Ballard said. I supposed you'd fly to tell me, dear.”

The girl looked tenderly back into the eyes that were sharp with inquiry. “Dear little mother,” she returned, “it can't be.”

“What can't be?”

“What you wish. Dr. Ballard.”

“Have you—refused him—!” Mrs. Evringham's face whitened, and unconsciously she stepped back.

“It didn't have to come to that. Dr. Ballard is so fine—such a wise man in so many ways. I do admire him so much.”

“What did you say to him? I will know!” exclaimed Mrs. Evringham passionately.

Eloise was mute, and her eyes besought her mother.

“Speak, I say! Was it Christian Science? Did you dare, Eloise Evringham, did you dare spoil your life—my life—our future, by scaring Dr. Ballard with that bugbear?” The angry woman was breathing fast.

“Mother dear, don't give us something so painful to remember. Don't, I beg of you. Dr. Ballard does not reproach me. He thinks I shall change, and he wishes to give me time to see if I do. Think of him, if you will not think of me. He would be so shocked to have you take it this way. If you could have seen how kind he was, how patient. Dear mother, don't cry. It isn't anything I can help, unless I should deliberately turn dishonest.”

But Mrs. Evringham did cry, and heartily. She hurried away to her own room as quickly as possible, and locked the door against Eloise, who lay awake for hours with a strange mingling of regret and joy at her heart, and a constant declaring of the truth.

At midnight the girl heard the door unlock and saw her mother emerge.

“Darling mamma!” she exclaimed, springing out of bed.

“Oh, Eloise,” moaned the poor woman, dissolving again upon her child's shoulder. “I never went to bed without your kiss, and I can't bear it. How can you be so cru—cru—cruel!”

“Darling, everything is going to come right,” returned Eloise, holding her close. “Nothing good would come of doing wrong. I never loved you so much as now. I never saw duty so plainly. Dearest, in one way I suffer for you, but still I was never so happy. I have grasped the end of the clue that will surely lead us safely through the labyrinth, no matter what life brings. You will see, mamma dear, after a while you will see. Don't go back. Come into my bed.”

Disconsolately Mrs. Evringham obeyed, and in a few minutes, worn out with emotion, she had sobbed herself to sleep in her child's arms; and although for many days afterward she wore a languid air, and declared that there was nothing to live for, she yielded herself to Eloise's courageous and quietly joyful atmosphere, with silent wonder at her child's altered outlook.

On the morning following the painful interview with her mother, Eloise presented herself in Jewel's room at the usual hour.

Smiling, she approached the child and exhibited three fresh new books. India paper editions of the Bible and “Science and Health,” and the little brown pamphlet were in her hands.

“Yours?” exclaimed the child.

Eloise nodded.

“Good, good!” Jewel hopped up and down, and forthwith brought Anna Belle to have her share in the rejoicing.

“You were afraid you couldn't get them. Now see!” cried the child triumphantly. “As if Divine Love couldn't send you those books!”

“He showed me a way,” returned the girl. “See where I've written my name. I want you to put 'Jewel' right under it in each one.”

“Oh, in those lovely books?” said the child doubtfully. “I don't write very well.”

“Yes, I want it, dear, when we go downstairs and can get some ink. Did anybody fix your hair yesterday?”

“I just brushed it down real smooth on the outside,” returned the child.

“It looks so,” said Eloise, laughing. “Let's fix it before we have the lesson. By the way, what time is it, Jewel?”

The little girl smiled back at her cousin's reflection in the glass, and took the open morocco case from the bureau. “Anna Belle and I put him to bed last night,” she said, looking fondly at the silver cherub on its velvet couch. “We've named him Little Faithful. He'll come to the lesson, too. I know he's going to be a lovely Scientist.”

“I'm sure I hope he will, and neither be fast nor lazy,” returned Eloise, as she unbraided the short pigtails.

“I tell you it wasn't so nice getting the lesson alone yesterday,” said Jewel. “You were away all day! Did you have a nice ride?”

“Yes,” Eloise responded slowly. “The day was very nice—and so is Dr. Ballard.”

“Did he enjoy it?” asked the child hopefully. The doctor had been a good deal on her mind.

“Some of the time,” responded Eloise soberly.

“Why not all the time? Did error creep in?”

The older girl brushed away in silence for a minute.

“I didn't mean to talk about grown-up things,” said the child, somewhat abashed. “Mother says I must be careful not to.”

“It is all right, Jewel. The new ideas I have been learning have made me see some things so clearly. One is to perceive what it is that really draws people together in a bond that cannot be broken. There is only one thing that can do it and will do it, and that is loving the same truth. Two people can have a very good time together for a while, and like each other very much, but the time comes when their thoughts fly apart unless that one bond of union is there—unless they love the same spiritual truth.”

The speaker caught, in the glass, the child's eyes fixed attentively upon her.

“Wouldn't Dr. Ballard look at our book?” asked Jewel softly.

“No, dear.”

The child reflected a minute, and her eyes filled. “I just love him,” she said.

Her cousin stooped and kissed her cheek. “You well may,” she returned quietly. “He deserves it.”

They studied the lesson and then went downstairs, where Jewel in her very best hand slowly transcribed her name in the new books; then she told Eloise that she was going out to the barn.

“I'm going to visit with Zeke,” she said. “He has a claim of error, and he is willing Science should help him.”

“Is he ill?”

Jewel looked off. “It isn't that kind of error.”

“There are plenty worse,” rejoined Eloise. She looked doubtfully at the little girl. “Wouldn't you better tell me, dear? Is it right for you to go?”

“Yes, it's right. His mother knows it, and she's so kind to me. What do you think! At breakfast she asked me if I wouldn't like to bring Anna Belle down. She says I can bring her to the table whenever I want to. Isn't it nice? The dear little creature has been so patient, never having a thing to eat!”

Eloise could not help laughing, the manner in which Jewel finished was so suddenly quaint; but she shook her head in silent wonder as she watched the short skirted figure setting forth for the barn.

“Oh cousin Eloise.” Jewel turned around. “Will you come to the ravine after lunch, and see what Anna Belle and I have done?”

“Yes.”

Jewel walked on a little further and turned again. “You won't wear your watch, will you?” she called.

“No, I'll surely forget it,” returned the girl, smiling.

The small figure went on, well content.

“Oh, if I could only be invisible in that barn!” soliloquized Eloise. “How I would like to hear what she will say. How wonderful it is that that little child has more chance of success, whatever trouble Zeke has been getting into, than any full-grown, experienced sage, philosopher, or reformer, who is a worker in mortal mind.”

Anna Belle came to luncheon that day. Mrs. Forbes actually put a cushion in one of the chairs to lift the honored guest to such a height that her rosy smile was visible above the tablecloth. Not content with this hospitality, the housekeeper brought a bread-and-butter plate, upon which she placed such small proportions of food as might be calculated to tempt a dainty appetite. Jewel felt almost embarrassed by the eminence to which her child was suddenly raised.

“Oh, thank you, Mrs. Forbes,” she said; “you needn't take so much trouble. Anna Belle's just used to having a part of mine.”

But nothing now was too good for Anna Belle. “She shall have a cup-custard to-morrow,” returned the housekeeper.

Mrs. Evringham looked on with lack-lustre eyes. As well make much of Anna Belle as any other idol. Everything was stuffed with sawdust!

How the sunbeams glanced in the woods that day as Jewel, one hand clasping her doll and the other in Eloise's, skipped along the road to the ravine!

When they had stooped under the wire and gone down the bank, how the brook sang, and how the violets bloomed in Jewel's garden!

“It's very pretty,” said Eloise, regarding the paths and flower beds which Jewel exhibited with pride. “It's very pretty, but it lacks one thing.”

“What?” asked the child eagerly.

“A pond.”

“But it is by the side of a rushing river,” returned Jewel.

“Yes, but all the more easy to have a pond.”

“How?”

“We'll set a shallow pan, and sink it in the ground, and plant ferns about it to hang over. Anna Belle can have some little china dolls to go in wading in it.”

“Oh yes, yes!” cried Jewel delighted. “Hear that, dearie? Hear what Love is planning for you?”

Anna Belle's nose was buried in the grass and her hat was awry. If she had a fault, it was a tendency to being overdressed. At present her plumed hat and large fluffy boa gave her an aspect unsympathetic with the surroundings. Jewel pulled her upright and placed her on the mossy divan.

“If I'd only brought the trowel I could get the hole ready,” Jewel was saying, when a whistle, soft and clear as a flute, sounded above the brook's gurgle.

She lifted a finger in caution. “Oh,” she whispered, looking up into her cousin's face, “the loveliest bird! Hush.”

Clear, sweet, flexible, somewhere among those high branches sounded again the same elaborate phrase.

Jewel was surprised to see her cousin's pleased, listening expression alter to eager wonder, then the girl flushed rosy red and started up. “Siegfried!” she murmured.

Again came the bird motif sifting down through the rustling leaves.

“Nat!” called Eloise gladly.

“Any nymphs down there?” questioned a man's voice.

“Oh yes!”

“May Pan come down?”

“Yes indeed.”

Jewel, watching and wondering, saw a young man in light clothes swing himself down from tree to tree, and at last saw both his hands close on both her cousin's.

The two talked and laughed in unison for a minute, then Eloise freed herself and turned to the serious-faced child. “You remember my speaking of Nat the other day?” she asked. “This is he. Mr. Bonnell, this is my cousin Jewel Evringham. She is landscape gardening just now, and may not feel like giving you her hand.”

“I can wash it,” said Jewel, dipping the earthy member in the brook, wiping it on the grass, and placing it in the large one that was offered her.

“How did you ever find us? I thought you'd gone back to New York. I had no idea of seeing you,” said Eloise in a breath.

“Didn't your mother tell you? I have a week off.”

The girl's bright face sobered. “Poor mother! She had a—a shock after you were here yesterday. I suppose it put everything out of her head. Was it she who sent you to find us?”

“No; a massive lady met me at the door and informed me that your mother wished to be excused from every one to-day, but that you had fallen down a crack in the earth which could be reached up this road.” The speaker looked about. “As there doesn't seem any place to stand here, hadn't we better sit down before we fall in the brook? I might rescue you, but the current is swift.”

Eloise at once sank upon the green incline, and he followed her example. Jewel watched him with consideration, and he became aware of her gaze.

“What are you making, little girl?” he asked, with his sunshiny smile.

“A garden; and I could dig the pond if I had brought the trowel.”

“Perhaps my knife will do.” He took it out and opened the largest blade. “What do you think of that?”

“Do you suppose I should break it?” asked the child doubtfully.

“You're welcome to try,” he replied.

She leaned forward and accepted it from his outstretched hand.

CHAPTER XXV

MUTUAL SURPRISES

“I thought I knew Bel-Air Park,” said Bonnell looking about him. “I never suspected this.”

“Jewel is the Columbus of this spot. She has named it the Ravine of Happiness.”

Nat looked at his speaker. “That's rather ambiguous. Does she mean where happiness is buried or where it is found?”

Eloise smiled. “Jewel never buries any happiness. Well, how is everybody, Nat? Your mother, first of all.”

“Didn't Mrs. Evringham tell you?”

The girl's face clouded with apprehension at his surprised tone. “No. You will think it very strange, but poor mamma was under such excitement, you must pardon her. Everything went out of her head. Don't tell me that dear Mrs. Bonnell”—she lowered her voice—“that you have lost her!”

He shook his head. “No, I've gained her. She's well.”

“Well!” repeated the girl amazed. “Why, what do you mean? How glorious! How long since?”

“About three months.”

“I am so glad! Tell me more good news. Tell me about your own frivoling, and then I shall hear about the other people.”

The young man shook his head. “I observed Lent this year scrupulously, and I haven't changed my tactics since Easter. I've been keeping my nose to the grindstone. Began to see things a little differently, Eloise. I decided it was mother's innings—decided to drop the butterfly and do the bee act.”

“Is it possible!” The girl laughed. “Will wonders never cease! What was the matter? Did the heiresses cut you?”

“I cut the whole thing, and I have my reward. I suppose your mother didn't tell you that, either. I'm going into business with Mr. Reeves. Do you know him? Jewel does.” He smiled toward the child, who lifted an interested face.

“Yes, I do,” she said. “You remember about him, cousin Eloise.”

“Certainly.” The girl looked at her friend questioningly.

“I'm spending this week at his house.”

“And you know about Jewel? He has told you?”

“Certainly. The one person of his acquaintance who hasn't to unlearn anything.”

“You mean he talked to you of Christian Science?”

Bonnell's hands were clasping his knees. His hat lay on the bank beside him and the thick hair tossed away from his brow. He nodded slowly, wondering at the sudden attentive interest of her look.

“Yes,” he replied. “We talked on the tabooed subject.”

“Tabooed with whom? You?” she asked disappointedly.

“No, with you I understand.”

Color flew into Eloise's face. “Who told you that? Mother of course.”

Bonnell nodded, giving a fleeting glance toward the child, who was again busy at her excavation.

“Are congratulations in order, Eloise?” he asked quietly.

“Yes, congratulations.” Her eyes grew full of light. “For I have come to see the truth. That child has shown me.”

The young man's lips remained apart for a second in his surprise at this declaration, after Mrs. Evringham's detailed representations.

“Then I may tell you how my mother was healed,” he said at last.

“Oh, was it really so?”

“Yes.”

“And you, Nat?” Unconsciously Eloise leaned her whole body toward him, supporting her hand on the ground. “You know about it yourself? You understand?”

“Yes.”

“And you believe in it?”

“With all my heart.”

Her face shone. “Oh, Jewel, do you hear? Mr. Bonnell is a Scientist.” The girl's breathing was hastened. Her eyes were like stars.

The child sank back from her work and regarded the visitor, smiling. She was glad, but she was not astonished. In her world a great many young men had found the key to life, but to Eloise it was something wonderful. She looked at her old friend as if she had never seen him before. She reviewed all she knew of his gay life with its background of suffering.

“Do you study the lessons?” she asked incredulously. “You?”

“Every day. I am surprised beyond measure to find you interested, for your mother told me—And the doctor—?”

“Is a very fine man,” returned Eloise gravely, as he paused.

Bonnell's mental questions were answered by her manner. He put his hand in the pocket of his sack coat and drew out a small, thin, black book.

Eloise took it. “'Unity of Good,'” she read on its cover. “I haven't seen this one,” she said eagerly.

“You will,” he replied.

She looked up. “Do you know, I thought just now you were going to take out your pipe?” she said naively. “That's where you used to keep it.”

“My pipe doesn't like me any more,” he rejoined quietly.

“Are you happy, Nat?” she asked, scrutinizing his face with childlike, searching eyes.

“I was never a very solemn codger, was I?” he returned.

“But are you happier? Does the world look different? Of course it does, with your mother well.”

“Oh yes,” he answered in a changed tone, tossing his head back, and making a gesture as of throwing away something. “There was nothing in it before, nothing in it.”

“Yes, yes, I know,” she returned comprehendingly.

Jewel had watched them, and now, as they paused, her voice broke the silence in which the two friends looked into each other's faces.

“Cousin Eloise is going to church with me on Sunday,” she announced.

“Oh, certainly.” Bonnell smiled. “Wednesday evening meetings and all now, Eloise. Haven't you attended yet?”

“No, I've only just learned. I've only just seen. I'm only beginning to see, Nat. Your mother was healed. Oh, it is true, isn't it! It's so wonderful to find that you, you, know more about it than I do, when I supposed you would scorn it. I can't help expecting to wake up.”

“That is just what you will do,” returned Bonnell. “You will waken—to a thousand things. So your mother objects.”

“Poor little mother,” returned Eloise, looking down with sudden sadness.

“My mother wants you and yours to make us a long visit at View Point this summer.”

The girl's lovely eyes raised hopefully. “The best thing that could happen,” she exclaimed.

“I think so,” responded her companion.

When Mr. Evringham returned from golf that afternoon, only his daughter-in-law was in sight. She inclined her head toward him with the air of a Lady Macbeth.

“Have you seen anything of the girls?” she asked as he approached her.

“Nothing. Where are they?”

She slowly shrugged her shoulders. “I'm the last one to ask. They wouldn't think of telling me,” she returned.

“What's up now?” thought Mr. Evringham. “You don't look well, Madge,” he said aloud.

Once she would have welcomed the evidence of solicitude. Now nothing mattered.

“I don't feel well,” she replied, “and I can't even call the physician I prefer.”

Mr. Evringham stared down at her for a silent minute, and light broke upon him.

“Is it all off with Ballard?” he asked bluntly.

“Yes; and that's what you have done, father, by allowing that child Jewel to come here.”

Mr. Evringham bit his lip. This amused him.

“Eloise has mounted the new hobby, and is riding for dear life away from common sense, away from everything that promised such happiness.”

“Do you mean Christian Science?”

“Of course I do.”

“It's a strange thing, Madge. Do you know, it captures people with good heads.” Mr. Evringham seated himself near his daughter's chair. “I came out on the train with my friend Reeves. He was talking about young Bonnell, of whom you spoke last night. Said his mother was cured when the doctors couldn't do anything. You know her, eh?”

“As well as if she were my own flesh and blood.”

“Is it a fact, what they say?”

“She was considered incurable. I know nothing about the rest of it. Nat was telling me yesterday. Now he is probably infatuated also, and, sooner or later, Eloise is sure to meet him.”

“H'm, h'm. An old flame, you said,” remarked Mr. Evringham. “Indeed! In—deed! I trust for your sake, Madge, that his is not objectionable to you.”

“He is,” snapped Mrs. Evringham. “A poor fellow, with his way to make in the world. He's been out of college a couple of years and hasn't done anything worth speaking of yet.”

“Reeves is going to take him into the business,” returned Mr. Evringham. “I don't know why or wherefore, but the mere fact is decidedly promising.”

“Oh, who can tell if that will last!” returned the other with scornful pessimism. “Nat has let too many cotillions to do anything else well. I can only pray that he will get away without seeing Eloise. Mrs. Bonnell has invited us to make her a visit this summer. I certainly shall not go one step!”

A sudden sound of laughter was heard on the quiet air. Mrs. Evringham leaned forward. “There are the children now,” she said, as figures turned in at the gateway; “and who is that? It is”—with desperation,—“he's here! Nat Bonnell is with them!”

She sat upright with disapproval, clasping the arm of her chair, while her father-in-law looked curiously at the approaching group. His gaze fixed on the young man with the well-set head who, swinging his hat in his hand, was talking fast to Eloise of something that amused them both. Jewel apparently interrupted him and he stooped with a quick motion, and in a second she was sitting on his shoulder, shrieking in gleeful surprise.

Thus they approached the piazza and came close before noting that it was occupied.

“Grandpa, see me!” cried Jewel delightedly.

Bonnell met the unsmiling gaze of his host as Mr. Evringham rose, and then caught sight of Mrs. Evringham stonily gazing from her chair.

“Ah, how do you do?” he called laughingly.

“Jove, he is a good looking chap!” thought the host, and Bonnell set Jewel down at his feet with such velocity that Anna Belle was cast heavily to earth.

“A thousand pardons!” exclaimed Nat, catching up the doll by the skirt and restoring her.

Jewel gave him a bright look. “She knows there is no sensation in matter,” she said scornfully.

Poor Anna Belle! The topography of the ravine was full of hazards for her, and her seasons there were always so adventurous and full of sudden and unlooked-for bumps that her philosophy was well tested, and she might reasonably have complained of this gratuitous blow; but she smiled on, as Jewel hugged her. Her mental poise was marvelous, whatever might be said of the physical.

Eloise introduced her friend and went to her mother's side, while Bonnell shook hands with Mr. Evringham and exchanged some words concerning Mr. Reeves and business matters.

“Wide awake,” was the older man's mental comment. “Doesn't seem at all the sort of person to be fooled about that healing business. Good eye. Good manner. Perhaps this was Ballard's handicap all the time. I guess you're in for it, Madge.”

Nat moved to greet Mrs. Evringham, who gave him no welcoming smile. She leaned back listlessly, not caring what effect she produced. He seemed to her a part of the combination entered into by the Fates to thwart and annoy.

Bonnell knew her nearly as well as Eloise did. “I'm sorry you're under the weather,” he said sympathetically, when he had discovered that, in his own phrase, there was “nothing doing.” “I received a letter from my mother to-day, in which she impressed upon me that she expected you both by the middle of June.”

“My plans have changed since yesterday, Nat,” returned Mrs. Evringham dismally. “Yes. We shall not be able to go to your mother's, as I had hoped. Some time during the season I shall try to look in on her of course. You tell her so, Nat, when you write.”

“Nonsense, nonsense, Mrs. Evringham. You don't in the least mean it,” he returned cheerfully, with the smile and manner which she could not and would not endure.

“I do mean it, Nat. I tell you my plans are changed. Eloise and I may go to Europe.”

Naturally she had never thought of Europe until that moment, but that laughing, caressing light in Nat Bonnell's eyes was insufferable.

“Ah, in that case, of course,” he returned, “we couldn't say a word,” and then he moved to go.

Mr. Evringham urged the visitor to stay to dinner, but he declined and once more shook hands.

“Good-by, Jewel,” he said to the child. “Sunday, you know.”

“Yes indeed, I know,” she returned, an irresistible tendency to hop moving her feet. On nearer acquaintance she had found Mr. Bonnell exhilarating.

“Good-by, Nat,” said Eloise.

He looked into the face on which rested a cloud. “I think you might be a degree more attentive,” he suggested.

“How?”

“Oh—take me to the gate, for instance.”

Eloise smiled and went with him. He turned with a slight bow that included the group, and they strolled down the path.

“It's all up, Madge,” remarked Mr. Evringham, half smiling. “No use wriggling, no use staying away from the mother. Might as well yield gracefully. I think Ballard might have been told, that's all.”

“There was nothing to tell, father! How can you be so unkind? That's just Nat's manner. He is used to everybody liking him, and always having his own way; but Eloise never—she never”—the speaker saw that if she continued, in a moment more she would be weeping, and she certainly was not going to weep in this company. So she contented herself by glaring toward the gate, where could be seen two figures in earnest conversation.

“I had counted so much on Mrs. Bonnell's influence,” Eloise was saying. “What does mother mean? She knows my mind is made up as to Christian Science. What is she afraid of?”

Bonnell caught his thumbs in his coat pockets and lifted himself slightly on his toes. “She is afraid of me.”

“Of you?” The girl lifted surprised eyes to his and let them fall again, her grave face coloring.

“She has always been more or less afraid of me. I'm ineligible, you know.”

“Yes, you are, awfully, Nat,” returned Eloise earnestly. “That's what makes you so nice. Didn't we always have a good time together?”

“Yes, on those rare occasions when we had a chance, but Mrs. Evringham always suspected me. She never felt certain that I wasn't waiting for your skirts to be lengthened and your hair to go up in order to steal you.”

Eloise tried to look at him, but found it more comfortable to examine the inexpressive gravel path. “But now you have something to think of besides girls,” she said gently.

“Yes. Do you know, Eloise, if I had been promised the granting of one wish as I took the cars for Bel-Air, it would have been that I might find you convinced of the truth of Christian Science.”

She looked at him now brightly, gladly. “It is such a help to me to know that you are in it,” she returned. Their hands simultaneously went forth and clasped. “What shall we do about mother?”

He smiled. “That will all come right,” he returned confidently.

“There are classes, Nat,” she said. “Have you been through one?”

“Not yet. Perhaps we could enter together.”

“Do you think so?” she returned eagerly.

He was looking down at her still—calm, strong.

She started. “I mustn't be late to dinner. Good-by. Sunday, Nat.”

“Not to-morrow? I want some golf.”

“Yes, go. It's a fine links. I'm sorry, but I'd better not go there for the present. Good-by.”

She was gone, so he strolled on and out through the park, and as he went he put two and two together, and suspected the cause of the girl's objection to golf.

CHAPTER XXVI

ON WEDNESDAY EVENING

“This is my silk dress, grandpa,” said Jewel, coming out on the piazza Sunday morning.

Mr. Evringham was sitting there reading the paper. He looked up to behold his granddaughter standing expectantly.

She had on the cherished frock. Her plump black legs ended in new shoes, the brim of her large hat was wreathed with daisies, snowy ribbons finished her well-brushed braids, while, happiest touch of all, Little Faithful was ticking away on her breast.

“Well, who is this bonnie lassie?” asked Mr. Evringham, viewing her.

“It's my best one,” said Jewel, smilingly, coming close to him.

“I should hope so. If you were anything grander I should have to put on smoked glasses to look at you. Church, eh?” He took the brown pamphlet she carried and examined it.

“Yes. I wish you were coming.”

“Oh, I have an important engagement at the golf club this morning.”

“Have you? Well, grandpa, I was thinking you can't play golf or ride at night, and wouldn't you take me Wednesday evening?”

“Where to?”

“Church.”

“Heavens, child! Wednesday evening prayer meeting?” asked the broker in perturbation.

“No. It's just lovely reading and singing and interesting stories,” replied Jewel, endeavoring to paint the picture as attractively as possible.

“H'm. H'm. Do you suppose Mr. Reeves goes?”

“Why, of course,” replied the child. “Scientists never stay away.”

“Then should I be considered a Scientist if I went? I still have some regard for my reputation.”

“A great many visitors go,” replied the child earnestly. Then she added, with unmistakably sincere naivete, “I don't mind leaving you in the daytime, because we're used to it; but I was thinking it would make me homesick, grandpa, to go away in the evening and leave you in the library.”

Mr. Evringham took her little hand in his. “Have you thought, Jewel,” he asked, “how it will be when you leave me altogether?”

“I shall have mother and father then,” returned the child.

“Yes; but whom shall I have?”

The question came curtly, and Jewel looked into the deep-set eyes in surprise. “Shall you miss me, grandpa?” she asked wonderingly.

“Whom shall I have, I say?” he repeated.

The child thought a minute. “Just who you had before,” she answered, slipping her arm around his neck. “There's Essex Maid, you know.”

The broker gave a short laugh. “Yes. It's lucky, isn't it?” he returned, rather bitterly.

“Do you like to have me with you, grandpa?” pursued the child, pleased.

“Yes; confound it, Jewel, yes.”

“Then Divine Love will fix it somehow, for I love to be with you, too.”

“You do, eh? Then I'll tell you that I received a letter from your father yesterday. It was a very pleasant letter, but it said they felt obliged, if they could, to stay over a little longer—two or three weeks longer.”

The child's face grew thoughtful.

“He said they had just received your letter, and were very pleased and thankful to know that you were happy. He said it would be a business advantage to them to stay, but that they could come home at the appointed time if you wished it. I am to cable them to-morrow, if you do.” Silence for a minute while Jewel thought. “Do you think you can be happy with me a little longer than you expected?”

“I do want to see mother and father very much,” returned the child, “but I'm just as happy as anything,” she added heartily, after a pause.

Mr. Evringham had listened with surprising anxiety for the verdict. “Very well, very well,” he returned, with extra brusqueness, picking up his newspaper. “I guess there won't be anything to prevent my going to that meeting with you Wednesday evening, Jewel. Just once, you understand, once only.”

At this moment the brougham drove around to the steps, and Eloise came out upon the piazza. She was a vision of dainty purity in her white gown, white hat, and gloves.

Mr. Evringham rose, lifted his hat, and going down the steps opened the door of the carriage. “A man need not be ashamed to have these two ladies represent him at church,” he said, looking into Eloise's calm eyes.

She smiled back at him. There was no suspicion now of sarcasm or stings. The air she breathed was wholesome and inviting. The lump had been leavened.

Arrived at the hall where the services were held, the girls were ushered into good seats before the room rapidly filled.

They saw Mr. Reeves and his family and Mr. Bonnell come in on the other side, and the latter did not rest until he had found them and sent over a bright, quick nod.

The platform was beautiful by a tall vase of roses at the side of the white reading-desk, and Eloise listened eagerly to the voices of the man and woman who alternately read the morning lesson. The peace, simplicity, and quiet of the service enthralled her. She looked over the crowd of listening, reverent faces with wistful wonder. Nat was among them, Nat! Sometimes she glanced across at his attentive face. Nat at church, in the morning; thoroughly interested! She pinched her arm to make quite certain.

Once when they rose to sing, it was the hymn she had heard. The voices swelled:—