s taken it very much to heart; he told
me--he's a client of mine, a stupid idiot, who never reasoned a thing out
in his life--he told me that 'not to believe in eternal damnation was to
take a short cut to atheism.' He also confided to me that 'a church which
could permit such a falling from the faith was in a diseased condition.'
I don't believe that opinion has reached Ward, however. It would take
more grit than Dean possesses to dare to find fault with John Ward's wife
to her husband."

"What folly!" cried the rector, his face flushed with annoyance. "What
possessed Helen to say such a thing! She ought to have had more sense.
Mark my words, that speech of hers will make trouble for Ward. I don't
understand how Helen could be so foolish; she was brought up just as Lois
was, yet, thank Heaven, her head isn't full of whims about reforming a
community. What in the world made her express such an opinion if she had
it, and what made her have it?"

Dr. Howe had risen, and walked impatiently up and down the room, and now
stood in front of Gifford, with a forefinger raised to emphasize his
words. "There is something so absurd, so unpleasant, in a young woman's
meddling with things which don't belong to her, in seeing a little mind
struggle with ideas. Better a thousand times settle down to look after
her household, and cook her husband's dinner, and be a good child."

Lois laughed nervously. "She has a cook," she said.

"Don't be pert, Lois, for Heaven's sake," answered her father, though
Miss Deborah had added,--

"Gifford says dear Helen is a very good housekeeper."

"Pray," continued the rector, "what business is it of hers what people
believe, or what she believes herself, for that matter, provided she's a
good girl, and does her duty in that station of life where it has pleased
God to put her,--as the wife of a Presbyterian minister? 'Stead of that
she tries to grapple with theological questions, and gets into hot water
with the parish. 'Pon my word, I thought better of the child! I'll write
and tell her what I think of it." (And so he did, the very next day. But
his wrath had expended itself in words, and his letter showed no more of
his indignation than the powdery ashes which fell out of it showed the
flame of the cigar he was smoking when he wrote it.) "And as for Ward
himself," the rector went on, "I don't know what to think of him. Did you
know he had given up his salary? Said 'Helen had enough for them to liv