So there was nothing for Missy to do but go home. The sun shone just as brightly as on her hither journey but now she had no impulse to skip. She walked along sedately, in rhythm to inner, long-drawn cadences. The cadences permeated her--were herself. She was sad, yet pleasantly, thrillingly so. It was divine. When she reached home, she went into the empty front-parlour and hunted out the big, cloth-covered hymnal that was there. She found “Asleep in Jesus” and played it over and over on the piano. The bass was a trifle difficult, but that didn't matter. Then she found other hymns which were in accord with her mood: “Abide with Me”; “Nearer My God to Thee”; “One Sweetly Solemn Thought.” The last was sublimely beautiful; it almost stole her favour away from “Asleep in Jesus.” Not quite, though. She was re-playing her first favourite when the folks all came in from church. There were father and mother, grandpa and grandma Merriam who lived in the south part of town, Aunt Nettie, and Cousin Pete Merriam. Cousin Pete's mother was dead and his father out in California on a long business trip, so he was spending that summer in Cherryvale with his grandparents. Melissa admired Cousin Pete very much, for he was big and handsome and wore more stylish-looking clothes than did most of the young men in Cherryvale. Also, he was very old--nineteen, and a sophomore at the State University. Very old. Naturally he was much wiser than Missy, for all her acquired wisdom. She stood in awe of him. He had a way of asking her absurd, foolish questions about things that everybody knew; and when, to be polite, she had to answer him seriously in his own foolish vein, he would laugh at her! So, though she admired him, she always had an impulse to run away from him. She would have liked, now, in this heavenly, religious mood, to run away lest he might ask her embarrassing questions about it. But, before she had the chance, grandpa said: “Why Missy, playing hymns? You'll be church organist before we know it!” Missy blushed. “'Asleep in Jesus' is my favourite, I think,” commented grandma. “It's the one I'd like sung over me at the last. Play it again, dear.” But Pete had picked up a sheet of music from the top of the piano. “Let's have this, Missy.” He turned to his grandmother. “Ought to hear her do this rag--I've been teaching her double-bass.” Missy shrank back as he placed the rag-time on the music-rest. “Oh, I'd rather not--to-day.” Pete smiled down at her--his amiable but condescending smile. “What's the matter with to-day?” he asked. Missy blushed again. “Oh, I don't know--I just don't feel that way, I guess.” “Don't feel that way?” repeated Pete. “You're temperamental, are you? How do you feel, Missy?” Missy feared she was letting herself in for embarrassment; but this was a holy subject. So she made herself answer: “I guess I feel religious.” Pete shouted. “She feels religious! That's a good one! She guesses she--”