Of course, Alice was silly--she seemed sometimes to have no mind, mortal or otherwise, though she was a dear, all the same--and Maud, as she sat here now eating her sandwich in this sheltered nest of heather, with the wild bees buzzing about her, and all the infinite and beneficent powers of Nature pursuing their functions heedless of any interpretations that the meddlesome mind of man might choose to put upon them, felt that she had done an injustice to the subject about which she inquired when she derided it just because a woman who was very silly gave absurd answers to questions which, though quite simple, were of the utmost profundity in that they concerned the origin of evil and sickness. Mrs. Yardly had not been a Christian Scientist long, and Maud now told herself that it was absurd to expect her all at once (for she understood so little before) to understand everything now. But what nettled her, though, indeed, she was not easily nettled, was to find that this same dear, stupid person did profess to be able to explain everything--mind, matter, and God alike. She claimed to have recaptured the faith of a child, and at once to be able to argue like a theologian about it. Maud herself was a professed and believing Christian, but had a brilliant Atheist subtly questioned her on the doctrine of the Incarnation, she knew quite well that many of his questions would be completely unanswerable. But because she was a Christian it did not follow she was a theologian, and she hoped that she would not try, by turning a blinding squirt of texts upon her questioner, to make him believe that she could explain the mystery of the material and spiritual world. She could not--many things were mysterious. But why not say so? That these things were mysterious did not prevent her being a Christian. She believed, too, the root doctrine of Christian Science--namely, that God was the Author of the world, and was immanent there. But surely it was wiser and truer to confess that one did not understand the whole working of the world in all its details; for if one did, one could manage it all oneself. Alice Yardly, Maud felt sure, would undertake the post with the greatest pleasure. And a pretty mess she would make of it, thought she. For Alice could never even contrive that the carriage should call for anybody at the right time or place, and constantly went out to dinner on the wrong night, for the confusion of hostesses. * * * * *