“She hasn’t accomplishments, beside her fine education, and music—” “All girls play, I suppose he sees other girls—” “And she saw but one man. That was the trouble. I wonder how fathers and mothers can help that. Roger wanted him to come to board through the winter, said a boarding-house was dismal, and his mother had just died—well, we can’t help it now. Don has cared for all the children—he was great friends with Maurice and John. If she will go to Bensalem and keep house for Roger, it will be just the thing.” “I think so myself,” he answered, reasonably. “Roger will be only too happy; his sister Marion has always been his sweetheart.” “Bensalem will do,” replied her father, hopefully, shifting all his responsibility; “when we visit them next summer she will be as rosy as ever and singing about the house like a bird.” “Then Roger must accept that call,” decided Roger’s mother positively. “A year in the country will brush off his student ways—it will be the best thing in the world for both of them.” “And poor Bensalem?” “It isn’t poor Bensalem,” she retorted, indignantly. “They knew what they wanted when they called Roger.” “Roger is a good boy, but he isn’t the least bit brilliant,” said Roger’s father, cheerfully. “He is something better,” said Roger’s mother. “But how can you get along without her?” “Better than Roger can. Besides, Martha and Lou will soon be through school; Roger and Marion are not our only children.” “You talk as though they were, sometimes,” he retorted. “Anyhow, let the sky fall, but do something for Marion.” VII. A SMALL DISCIPLE. “Who comes to God an inch through doubtings dim, In blazing light God will advance a mile to him.” —From the Persian. Aunt Rody gave Judith a nudge. The nudge startled the absorbed reader into dropping, with a thud, the book she held in her hand upon the carpeted floor of the pew; with a crimsoned face Judith stooped and picked up the book; after a moment of deliberation and a defiant flash toward Aunt Rody, stiff and straight in the end of the pew, she re-opened her book and was again lost in the fascinating story. Aunt Rody glared at her, but she turned a page, only half conscious of the wrath that was being heaped up against her; this time it was not a nudge, but a large hand that startled her; the large hand, brown, strong, was laid across the page. Judith gave a glance, not defiant, into the kindly, grave eyes, then shut the book, straightened herself and tried hard to listen to the minister. The figure at the other end of the pew, the man’s figure, settled back comfortably to listen, and listened without trying hard.