Jose, to my home," wailed the
girl. "I don't understand the ways and the thoughts of these people.
They don't know God--they don't know what love is--they don't know
anything but money, and clothes, and sin, and death. When I am with
them I gasp, I choke--"

"Yes, dearest, I understand," murmured the woman softly, as she
stroked the brown head nestling upon her shoulder. "It is social
asphyxia. And many even of the 'four hundred' are suffering from the
same disease; but they would die rather than admit it. Poor, blind
fools!"

To no one could the attraction which had drawn Carmen and the Beaubien
together seem stranger, more inexplicable, than to that lone woman
herself. Yet it existed, irresistible. And both acknowledged it, nor
would have had it otherwise. To Carmen, the Beaubien was a sympathetic
confidante and a wise counselor. The girl knew nothing of the woman's
past or present life. She tried to see in her only the reality which
she sought in every individual--the reality which she felt that Jesus
must have seen clearly back of every frail mortal concept of humanity.
And in doing this, who knows?--she may have transformed the sordid,
soiled woman of the world into something more than a broken semblance
of the image of God. To the Beaubien, this rare child, the symbol of
love, of purity, had become a divine talisman, touching a dead soul
into a sense of life before unknown. If Carmen leaned upon her, she,
on the other hand, bent daily closer to the beautiful girl; opened her
slowly warming heart daily wider to her; twined her lonely arms daily
closer about the radiant creature who had come so unexpectedly into
her empty, sinful life.

"But, mother dear"--the Beaubien had long since begged Carmen always
to address her thus when they were sharing alone these hours of
confidence--"they will not listen to my message! They laugh and jest
about real things!"

"True, dearie. And yet you tell me that the Bible says wise men
laughed at the great teacher, Jesus."

"Oh, yes! And his message--oh, mother dearest, his message would have
helped them so, if they had only accepted it! It would have changed
their lives, healed their diseases, and saved them from death. And my
message"--her lip quivered--"my message is only his--it is the message
of love. But they won't let me tell it."

"Then, sweet, live it. They can not prevent that, can they?"

"I do live it. But--I am so out of place among them. They scoff at
real th