s, she said: 'And when did you come to the conclusion
that you had a soul above the frivolities of this world?'

'Does that conclusion seem very absurd to you, Miss Rayner?'

She looked at me with an odd kind of smile. 'I believe you could be a
little spitfire if you liked,' she said. 'You must remember I have
lived a little longer in the world than you have. And I have met with
young girls of something the same stamp as yourself, who ran away from
home duties to visit in the slums, and because they despise men of the
world, lavish all their love and adoration on a wishy-washy curate, who
very often encourages them, and then gives them the slip in the end,
sending them back to their homes sadder and wiser women. My sister has
cause for thankfulness that there is no curate in her parish.'

'Miss Rayner, I don't think I quite deserve that,' I said.

She laughed. 'I am very rude and plain-spoken. You must put up with
that if you come to stay with me. I did promise not to catechise you
the first evening, didn't I? But the temptation proves too strong. I
have had a lot of disagreeable business to-day, and now I feel I want
relaxation and amusement.'

'Why have _you_ given up going out into society?' I asked.

'Ah! Now you are turning the tables on me. But I have lived my
life--you have yours yet to come. Can you give me any clear reason why
you should be different to the Forsyths? Is it a matter of principle?
If so, what is the principle?'

'"Be not conformed to this world,"' I said, in a low voice, but a
steady one; '"Come out from among them, and be ye separate." Those are
two commands I am trying to obey, Miss Rayner.'

'Why?' was the curt inquiry.

'Because I belong to Christ, and I want to carry out His wishes.'

'I don't think Christ shunned society. If I remember my Bible rightly,
He did quite the reverse.'

'He would not have been found in the fashionable Roman Court society,'
I said. 'I don't know much of the world, Miss Rayner; perhaps that is
why I feel, if I went right into every sort of gaiety I should not be
able to stop myself. I know I should become so fascinated and
engrossed that I should think of nothing else. Don't you think it very
engrossing? When you went out yourself, didn't you find it so?'

'I don't believe I have been put through my catechism so for years,'
was Miss Rayner's reply. 'I reserve to myself the right of asking
questions. And so you try to make your life