“I suppose it is. But I think I could enjoy ever so many things for years and years without growing blase,” said Erica. “Sometimes I like just to fancy what life might be if there were no tiresome Christians, and bigots, and lawsuits.” Charles Osmond laughed to himself in the dim light; the remark was made with such perfect sincerity, and it evidently had not dawned on the speaker that she could be addressing any but one of her father's followers. Yet the words saddened Him too. He just caught a glimpse through them of life viewed from a directly opposite point. “Your father has a lawsuit going on now, has he not?” he observed, after a little pause. “Oh, yes, there is almost always one either looming in the distance or actually going on. I don't think I can ever remember the time when we were quite free. It must feel very funny to have no worries of that kind. I think, if there wasn't always this great load of debt tied round our necks, like a millstone, I should feel almost light enough to fly. And then it IS hard to read in some of those horrid religious papers that father lives an easy-going life. Did you see a dreadful paragraph last week in the 'Church Chronicle?'” “Yes, I did,” said Charles Osmond, sadly. “It always has been the same,” said Erica. “Father has a delightful story about an old gentleman who at one of his lectures accused him of being rich and self-indulgent--it was a great many years ago, when I was a baby, and father was nearly killing himself with overwork--and he just got up and gave the people the whole history of his day, and it turned out that he had had nothing to eat. Mustn't the old gentleman have felt delightfully done? I always wonder how he looked when he heard about it, and whether after that he believed that atheists are not necessarily everything that's bad.” “I hope such days as those are over for Mr. Raeburn,” said Charles Osmond, touched both by the anecdote and by the loving admiration of the speaker. “I don't know,” said Erica, sadly. “It has been getting steadily worse for the last few years; we have had to give up thing after thing. Before long I shouldn't wonder if these rooms in what father calls 'Persecution alley' grew too expensive for us. But, after all, it is this sort of thing which makes our own people love him so much, don't you think?” “I have no doubt it is,” said Charles Osmond, thoughtfully.