A Beautiful Possibility. Edith Ferguson Black
whom do you mean?"
"Jesus Christ."
Aghast, the Bishop's lady crossed herself and began repeating the
Apostles' Creed.
"That makes him seem so far away," said Evadne sadly. "I do not want him in heaven if I have to live upon earth. Have you found him?" she asked eagerly. "Are you on intimate terms with him? Is he your friend?"
The Bishop's lady gasped for breath. That she, a member of the Church of the Holy Communion of All Saints should be interrogated in such a fashion as this! "I think you do not quite understand," she said coldly. "I will lend you a treatise on Church Doctrine. You had better study that."
"Charlotte," said her husband when she reached her stateroom, "I have arrived at an important decision this afternoon. I have finally concluded to take the Socinian Heresy as my theme for the noon lectures. The subject will admit of elaborate treatment and afford ample scope for scholarship."
"Heresy!" echoed his wife, who had not yet recovered her equanimity; "why, Bertram, I have just been talking to a young person who asked me if I was on intimate terms with Jesus Christ!"
"Ah, yes," said the Bishop absently, "the radical tendencies of the present day are to be deplored. Have you seen that my vestments are in order, Charlotte? I shall hold Divine service on board to-morrow."
In a neighboring stateroom a lonely soul, bewildered and despairing, struggled through the darkness towards the light.
* * * * *
The last snow of the winter lay in soft beauty upon the streets of Marlborough as Evadne's train drew into the railway station. Instantly all was bustle and confusion throughout the cars. Evadne shrank back in her seat and waited. Instinctively she felt that for her there would be no joyous welcome. Inexpressibly dreary as the journey had been she was sorry it was at an end. An overwhelming embarrassment of shyness seized upon her, and the chill desolation of loneliness seemed to shut down about her like a cloud.
A young man sauntered past her with his hands in his pockets. When he reached the end of the car he turned and surveyed the passengers leisurely, then he came back to her seat. He lifted his hat with lazy politeness.
"Miss Hildreth, I believe?"
Evadne bowed. He shook hands coolly.
"I have the honor of introducing myself as your cousin Louis."
He made no attempt to give her a warmer greeting, and Evadne was glad, but how dreary it was!
Louis led the way out of the station to where a pair of magnificent horses stood, tossing their regal heads impatiently. A colored coachman stood beside them, clad in fur.
"Pompey," he said, "this is Miss Evadne Hildreth from Barbadoes."
The man bent his head low over the little hand which was instantly stretched out to him. "I'se very glad to see Miss 'Vadney," he said with simple fervor. "I was powerful fond of Mass Lennux;" and Evadne felt she had received her warmest welcome.
She nestled down among the soft robes of the sleigh while the silver bells rang merrily through the frosty air. It was all so new and strange. A leaden weight seemed to be settling down upon her heart and she felt as if she were choking, but she threw it off. She dared not let herself think. She began to talk rapidly.
"What splendid horses you have! Surely they must be thoroughbreds? No ordinary horses could ever hold their heads like that."
Louis nodded. "You have a quick eye," he said approvingly. "Most girls would not know a thoroughbred from a draught horse. You have hit upon the surest way to get into my father's good graces. His horses are his hobby."
"What are their names?"
"Brutus and Caesar. The Judge is nothing if not classical."
As they mounted the front steps the faint notes of a guitar sounded from the front room.
"Confound Isabelle and her eternal twanging!" muttered Louis, as he fumbled for his latch-key. "It would be a more orthodox welcome if you found your relations waiting for you with open arms, but the Hildreth family is not given to gush. Isabelle will tell you it is not good form. So we keep our emotions hermetically sealed and stowed away under decorous lock and key, polite society having found them inconvenient things to handle, partaking of the nature of nitroglycerine, you know, and liable to spontaneous combustion."
He opened the door as he spoke and Evadne followed him into the hall. She shivered, although a warm breath of heated air fanned her cheek. The atmosphere was chilly.
Marion, hurried forward to greet her, followed more leisurely by
Isabelle and her mother, who touched her lips lightly to her forehead.
"I hope you have had a pleasant journey, my dear, although you must find our climate rather stormy. I think you might as well let the girls take you at once to your room and then we will have dinner."
"Where is the Judge?" inquired Louis.
"Detained again at the office. He has just telephoned not to wait for him. He is killing himself with overwork."
To Evadne the dinner seemed interminable and she found herself contrasting the stiff formality with the genial hospitality of her father's table. She saw again the softly lighted room with its open windows through which the flowers peeped, and heard his gay badinage and his low, sweet laugh. Could she be the same Evadne, or was it all a dream?
Isabelle stood beside her as she began to prepare for the night. She wished she would go away. The burden of loneliness grew every moment more intolerable. Suddenly she turned towards her cousin and cried in desperation—
"Can you tell me where I shall find Jesus Christ?"
Isabelle started. "My goodness, Evadne, what a strange question! You took my breath away."
"Is it a strange question?" she asked wistfully. "Everyone seems to think so, and yet—my father said I was to make it the business of my life to find him."
"Your father!" cried Isabelle. "Why Uncle Lenox was an——"
Instantly a pair of small hands were held like a vice against her lips.
Isabelle threw them off angrily.
"You are polite, I must say! Is this a specimen of West Indian manners?"
"You were going to say something I could not hear," said Evadne quietly, "there was nothing else to do."
Isabelle left the room, and, returning, threw a book carelessly upon the table. "You had better study that," she said. "It will answer your questions better than I can."
"I told you she was a heathen!" she exclaimed, as she rejoined her mother in the sitting-room; "but I did not know that I should have to turn missionary the first night and give her a Bible!"
Upstairs Evadne buried her face among the pillows and the aching heart burst its bonds in one long quivering cry of pain.
"Dearest!"
CHAPTER IV.
A day full of light—warm and brilliant. The sun flooding the wide fields of timothy and clover and fresh young grain with glory; falling with a soft radiance upon the comfortable mansion of the master of Hollywood Farm, with its spacious barns and long stretches of stabling, and throwing loving glances among the leaves of its deep belt of woodland where the river sparkled and soft rugs of moss spread their rich luxuriance over an aesthetic carpet of resinous pine needles.
Near the limits of Hollywood the forest made a sudden curve to the right, and the river, turned from its course, rushed, laughing and eager, over a ridge of rocks which tossed it in the air in sheets of silver spray.
Standing