oman in the parish shrieked sacrilege.
Strong had no respect for the church and no wish to save it trouble, but
he believed that Hazard was going blindly under Esther's influence which
would sooner or later end by drawing him away from his old forms of
belief; and as this was entirely Hazard's affair, if he chose to risk
the danger, Strong chose to help him.

"Why not?" said Strong to himself. "It is not a question of earning a
living. Both of them are well enough off. If he can turn her into a
light of his church, let him do it. If she ends in dragging him out of
the church, so much the better. She can't get a better husband, and he
can't find a better wife. I mean to see this thing through."

So George strolled round to Esther's house after this interview with his
aunt, thinking that he might be able to do good. Being at home there, he
went up-stairs unannounced, and finding no one in the library he climbed
to the studio, where, on opening the door, he saw Catherine sitting
before the fire, looking very much bored. Poor Catherine found it hard
to keep up with life in New York. Fresh from the prairie, she had been
first saturated with art, and was now plunged in a bottomless ocean of
theology. She was glad to see Strong who had in her eyes the advantage
of being more practical than the rest of her friends.

"Catherine, how are your sheep?"

"I am glad you have come to look after them," answered Catherine. "I
won't be watch-dog much longer. They are too troublesome."

"What mischief are they doing now?"

"Every thing they can think of to worry me. Esther won't eat and can't
sleep, and Mr. Hazard won't sleep and can't eat. She tries not to worry
him, so she comes down on me with questions and books enough to frighten
a professor. Do tell me what to say!"

"Where are your questions?" asked Strong.

"This morning she wanted to know what I thought of apostolic succession.
She said she was reading some book by a Dr. Newman. What is apostolic
succession?"

"A curious disease, quite common among the poorer classes of Sandwich
Islanders," replied Strong. "No one has ever found a cure for it."

"Don't laugh at us! We do nothing but cry now, except when Mr. Hazard is
here, and then we pretend to be happy. When Esther cries, I cry too.
That makes her laugh. It's our only joke, and we used to have so many."

"Don't you think it rather a moist joke?" asked Strong. "I take mine
dry."

"I can't tell what she will think a