d listened respectfully as in duty bound, and had gone home
unconvinced.

But Anna did not let him stand long in the hall, and came to fetch him
and beg him to help her read the letters and tell her what he thought of
them. In spite of Trudi's advice and example she continued to treat the
pastor with the deference due to a good and simple man. What did it
matter if he talked twice as much as he need have done, and wearied her
with his habit of puffing Christianity as though it were a quack
medicine of which he was the special patron? He was sincere, he really
believed something, and really felt something, and after five days with
Trudi Anna turned to Manske's elementary convictions with relief. In
five days she had come to be very glad that Trudi stood in no need of a
place among the twelve.

Most of the women who wrote in answer to the advertisement sent
photographs, and their letters were pitiful enough, either because of
what they said or because of what they tried to hide; and Anna's
appreciation of Trudi received a great shock when she found that the
letters amused her, and that the photographs, especially those of the
old ones or the ugly ones, moved her to a mirth little short of
unseemly. After all, Trudi was taking a great deal upon herself, Anna
thought, reading the letters unasked, helping her to open them unasked,
hurrying down to fetch them unasked, and deluging her with advice about
them unasked. She saw she had made a mistake in allowing her to see them
at all. She had no right to expose the petitions of these unhappy
creatures to Trudi's inquisitive and diverted eyes. This fact was made
very patent to her when one of the letters that Trudi opened turned out
to be from a person she had known. "Why," cried Trudi, her face
twinkling with excitement, "here's one from a girl who was at school
with me. And her photo, too--what a shocking scarecrow she has grown
into! She is only two years older than I am, but might be forty. Just
look at her--and she used to think none of us were good enough for her.
Don't have her, whatever you do--she married one of the officers in
Bill's first regiment, and treated him so shamefully that he shot
himself. Imagine her boldness in writing like this!" And she began
eagerly to read the letter.

Anna got up and took it out of her hands. It was an unexpected action,
or Trudi would have held on tighter. "She never dreamed you would see
what she wrote," said Anna, "and it would b