y I desired to see was at home.

When Mother Anastasia came into the drawing-room, where I awaited her,
she wore the gray gown of her sisterhood, but no head covering. I had
before discovered that a woman could be beautiful in a Martha gown, but
at this moment the fact asserted itself with peculiar force. She greeted
me with a smile and an extended hand.

"You do not seem surprised to see me," I said.

"Why should I be?" she answered. "I saw you in the House of
Representatives, and wondered why you should doze when such an
interesting matter was being discussed; and when I came home, and heard
that a gentleman answering your description intended to call on me this
evening, I declined to go out to the theatre, wishing to be here to
receive you."

I was disgusted to think that she had caught me napping, and that she
had been near me in the House and I had not known it, but I said nothing
of this.

"You are very good," I remarked, "to give up the theatre"--

"Oh, don't thank me," she interrupted; "perhaps you will not think I am
good. Before we say anything more, I want you to tell me whether or not
you came here to talk about Sylvia Raynor."

Here was a blunt question, but from the bottom of my heart I believed
that I answered truly when I said I had not come for that purpose.

"Very good," said Mother Anastasia, leaning back in her chair. "Now I
can freely say that I am glad to see you. I was dreadfully afraid you
had come to talk to me on that forbidden subject, and I must admit that
this fear had a very powerful influence in keeping me at home this
evening. If you had come to talk to me of her, I would have had
something very important to say to you, but I am delighted that my fears
were groundless. And now tell me how you could help being interested in
that grand scheme for a woman's college."

"I have never given it any thought. Do you care for it?"

"Care for it!" she exclaimed. "I am enlisted in the cause, hand and
heart. I came down here because the bill was to be brought before the
House. If the college is established,--and I believe it will be,--I
expect to be one of the faculty."

"You are not a physician?" said I.

"Oh, I have studied and practiced medicine," she answered, "and expect
to do a great deal more of it before we begin operations. The
physician's art is my true vocation."

"And you will leave the House of Martha?" I asked.

"Yes," she replied. "The period for which I entered it has