me 
 
 COM I No

 
 c.
 
 bp li^a me SMljite 
 
 WINTERBOROUGH. A Novel. i6mo, $1.25; 
 paper, 50 cents. 
 
 WHEN MOLLY WAS SIX. A Book for Chil- 
 dren. With Colored Cover Design and other 
 Illustrations. Square i6mo, $1.00. 
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. A Novel. 
 
 i6mo, $1.25. 
 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA 
 
 ELIZA ORNE WHITE 
 
 AUTHOR OF " WINTERBOROUGH," " MISS BROOKS," ETC. 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 
 
 (Cbe iiiucrsiDc press, Cambn&ge 
 1895
 
 Copyright, 1895, 
 BY EUZA OKNE WHITE. 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
 The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A. 
 Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Hougbton & Co.
 
 TO 
 
 MY MOTHER 
 
 17I1S81
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 I. 
 
 EVERY one in the Davidson household was 
 rejoicing over the coming of Theodora, from 
 her brother, the master of the house, down to 
 the little maid who swept and made ready her 
 room. Every one in Edgecomb was rejoicing, 
 too; for Edgecomb was small enough to re- 
 joice with those who rejoice. 
 
 It was twelve years since Theodora had 
 gone from the narrow, kindly community into 
 the great world, but she had left behind her 
 a vivid impression of her capacity, strength, 
 and fearlessness. She had gone away a girl 
 of sixteen ; she was coming back a woman of 
 twenty-eight, with the prestige of a college 
 education, and the more recent honor of an 
 excellent position as teacher of political econ- 
 omy and history in a Western college.
 
 2 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 "Ned, do tell me something about Theo- 
 dora," Mrs. Davidson had said to her hus- 
 band when he proposed inviting his sister to 
 spend her summer vacation with them. 
 
 " You know I have n't seen her, except for 
 a day or two, since she was sixteen," he had 
 returned. " She was a very good fellow then. 
 I beg her pardon, but she was such a tomboy 
 that I was in the habit of considering her 
 somewhat in the light of a brother. We were 
 great chums ; although she is two years 
 younger than I, she was in all my classes. " 
 
 "Was she pretty?" 
 
 " Not pretty, exactly, and yet certainly not 
 plain. She had handsome blue eyes, with 
 dark lashes, and when I knew her she had not 
 discovered that eyes can be used for other pur- 
 poses than to see with," and he glanced at 
 his wife, who raised her brown eyes with a 
 protesting expression. 
 
 " Is she dark or light ? " she inquired. 
 
 " Her hair is dark, a little darker than 
 mine, and her complexion neither dark nor 
 light, as I remember it, a good, useful tint 
 that can go without veils all summer, and 
 only look the better for a few shades of tan."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 3 
 
 " Is she fond of children ? " 
 
 "I don't know; but I am sure that she is 
 enormously efficient, and I have no doubt, 
 Marie, that she will be delighted to preside 
 over your mending-basket. You will like her 
 immensely." 
 
 Marie gave a gentle sigh as she looked at 
 the aforesaid basket, which was piled high 
 with small stockings and tiny undergarments. 
 She was a graceful woman, with both charm 
 and beauty and a manner that suited her face. 
 
 " I shall be delighted to have your sister 
 come," she responded cordially. 
 
 In this case she spoke the absolute truth, 
 but she would have said the same thing if 
 Theodora had been represented as a terma- 
 gant, so strong was her belief in wifely sub- 
 mission, and so great was her dislike of wound- 
 ing the feelings of those she loved. It is 
 hardly necessary to add that Marie Davidson 
 was a favorite, not only with men, but also 
 with her own sex, which is perhaps a greater 
 compliment to a woman. As a girl she had 
 the prospect of a brilliant future, for she 
 showed sufficiently pronounced artistic talent 
 to make two years in Paris seem a necessity,
 
 4 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 and she had made a mark for herself during 
 those two years. Her course, however, had 
 been impeded by a number of importunate 
 lovers, for, although she could not make up 
 her mind to desert her art for the sake of any 
 one of them, she was too tender-hearted to 
 view their pain with equanimity. At last 
 Edward Davidson, a brilliant and fascinating 
 young artist, appeared upon the scene and at 
 once joined the ranks of her suitors, and 
 Marie, after a struggle of a few months, con- 
 sented to become his wife. He vowed that 
 her marriage should make no difference in her 
 career, and urged that they could continue 
 their work together, a suggestion which was 
 more magnanimous in sound than in reality, 
 as her talent was far more pronounced than 
 his. They lived in Europe for some years 
 after their marriage, and Marie painted in 
 the intervals of baby-tending, while Edward 
 planned great pictures that he was to do in 
 the future, and made a few clever sketches. 
 Perhaps they never would have come home, so 
 dear was the freedom of the foreign life to 
 both of them, if it had not been for the death 
 of Edward's father and the consequent rever-
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 5 
 
 sion to himself of a considerable fortune, as 
 well as the old family estate in Edgecomb. 
 They somewhat reluctantly agreed that Amer- 
 ica was a better country than France for chil- 
 dren to grow up in, and transported their 
 little flock across the Atlantic, and then pro- 
 ceeded, somewhat to the consternation of their 
 good Edgecomb friends, to set up their easels 
 in the sacred best parlor of the Davidson 
 mansion. Mrs. Davidson gave several hours 
 a day to her painting, and, as the oldest of her 
 three children was only six, it is no wonder that 
 all Edgecomb rejoiced in the coming of Theo- 
 dora. Not that the little Davidsons were neg- 
 lected in any graver particular, but that there 
 was a paucity of buttons on their gowns, and 
 a general scantiness of wardrobe, which might 
 be picturesque and convenient, but which did 
 not recommend itself to this conventional com- 
 munity. 
 
 The Davidsons came home in December, 
 and Theodora joined them the following June. 
 She arrived one bright day when Edgecomb 
 was buried in green, with its leafy streets in 
 their first freshness, and every garden a bower 
 of roses. The little town nestled at the foot
 
 6 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 of some green hills which surrounded it, and 
 helped, together with its placid river, to make 
 it the charming village it was. Architectu- 
 rally there was much to be desired, according 
 to its inhabitants, but they took heart of grace 
 when Edward Davidson, fresh from European 
 travel, heartily admired the square white 
 houses with their green blinds, and the smaller 
 white cottages with their vine-covered piazzas. 
 As Theodora drove through the Edgecomb 
 main street with her brother, there was not a 
 pedestrian, however humble, who was not inter- 
 ested in catching a glimpse of the artist's sis- 
 ter. 
 
 When they reached the Davidson house, 
 which was half a mile away from the centre 
 of the town, Theodora alighted from the 
 carriage before Edward could help her out 
 and ran quickly up the steps. 
 
 " Oh the dear old white house! " she cried. 
 " Here is the brass knocker just as it used to 
 be, and the green front door. I am so glad 
 that you have left everything as it was, Ed- 
 ward ! " 
 
 The door opened as she spoke, and a fair- 
 haired, brown-eyed lady in a pink gown ap-
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 1 
 
 peared in the square hall, with a small girl 
 clinging to one hand, and a smaller child of 
 uncertain sex burying its face in the folds of 
 its mother's gown, while another little girl 
 glanced dubiously through a half-opened door. 
 
 " Dora, this is the aunt for whom you are 
 named," explained Mrs. Davidson. "Why, 
 my little daughter, how naughty you are ! " 
 she added, as Dora flatly refused to be kissed 
 by her relative. " And this is Guy," she con- 
 tinued, gently pushing forward the toddling 
 baby ; " and where is Gladys ? Come, Gladys, 
 and kiss your aunt." 
 
 " That is too much to expect," said Theo- 
 dora in her pleasant voice as she followed her 
 sister-in-law into the parlor. 
 
 There could not have been a greater con- 
 trast than these two women presented, and 
 Edward Davidson wondered how well they 
 would understand each other as he watched 
 them during the evening. He looked first 
 at Marie with Theodora's eyes. Surely no 
 one could help thinking her pretty, with her 
 exquisite complexion and her fluffy, golden- 
 brown hair. But would not Theodora think 
 its artistic and careless arrangement untidy ?
 
 8 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Then, too, would she quite like that enchant- 
 ing but somewhat conscious smile, and the 
 upward, appealing glance from those soft 
 eyes ? He noticed, also, that his wife's grace- 
 ful pink gown was a little the worse for wear. 
 Would his sister see that soiled line around 
 the bottom? These reflections were induced 
 by the striking impression which the first 
 glimpse of Theodora made upon him. She 
 looked so self-reliant, so exquisitely neat, 
 so frank, and as utterly unconscious of her 
 attractions as if she were a sensible man. 
 There was a simplicity and a breeziness about 
 her which was refreshing, and she was un- 
 usually fine-looking. Her blue eyes had a 
 charm of their own, from the directness of 
 their glance, and her brown hair was arranged 
 simply, but with such finished care that it 
 gave her a look of distinction. The same 
 perfection was seen in her dress, a plain blue 
 serge, which could bear a microscopic inspec- 
 tion as to its cut and its spotless tidiness. 
 Theodora was tall, even taller than Marie, 
 and she had a figure built for strength rather 
 than grace ; but her straight carriage and a 
 certain fearlessness of movement prevented
 
 THE COMING OF THEODOBA. 9 
 
 her from seeming awkward, and added to the 
 impression of distinction that Edward had al- 
 ready received. He next proceeded to look at 
 Theodora with Marie's eyes. Would not she 
 be repelled by her directness? Would not 
 she be appalled by her neatness ? Would not 
 her range of subjects seem hopelessly deep to 
 the poor child ? 
 
 Edward, however, was a closer observer 
 than either of the women, and was rendered 
 nervous by his love for them. 
 
 At the end of the evening, Marie took one 
 of the old brass candlesticks from the high 
 white mantelpiece and lighted Theodora to her 
 bedroom. 
 
 " It is my own old room," Theodora said as 
 she paused on the threshold. " How good of 
 you to give it to me ! " 
 
 " We thought you would feel more at home 
 in it. We have left the flowered paper on 
 the wall, although it is a little soiled, because 
 we thought if you wanted a new one you 
 would rather choose it yourself. The furni- 
 ture is all old, you see, except the brass bed- 
 stead." 
 
 " What lovely roses ! " exclaimed Theodora.
 
 10 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Edward has not forgotten how much I used 
 to care about the moss-rose bush under the 
 lilac. What a good picture of the children ! " 
 and she paused before a sketch of Dora and 
 Gladys in a very foreign-looking garden with 
 their French bonne. " How Edward has im- 
 proved ! It is the best thing of his I have ever 
 seen. It is charming, but why didn't he put 
 you in, instead of the nurse ? " 
 
 " I painted it," Marie replied, while a wave 
 of color made her prettier than ever. 
 
 " I had no idea that you could paint like 
 that." 
 
 "I hope you have everything you want," 
 said Marie as she turned to leave the room. 
 " I am rather a shiftless housekeeper, and 
 I am always seized with a fear lest I have 
 forgotten pins or matches." 
 
 " I am sure you have forgotten nothing." 
 Then Theodora, with a sudden impulse of 
 which she seemed half ashamed, put her arm 
 about Marie and gave her a kiss. " Good- 
 night, dear," she said. " I can't thank you 
 enough, or half tell you how delightful it is to 
 be here." 
 
 " Why, Ned, she is charming," Marie enthu-
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 11 
 
 siastically declared when she joined her hus- 
 band. " I have fallen hopelessly, desperately, 
 in love with her. I should love her because 
 she looks so much like you, if for no other rea- 
 son. How nice it was of her not to make the 
 children kiss her! And how clever she is! 
 Where did she ever learn so much about in- 
 vestments, and the stock exchange, and the 
 condition of the poor in Europe ? She knows 
 a great deal more about the poor in Europe 
 than we do, although we lived there for eight 
 years." 
 
 " My dear, our minds were wholly taken up 
 with the condition of two of the poor." 
 
 The next morning Edward was still further 
 relieved when Theodora said, "I must tell 
 you how much I like Marie. I have never 
 believed in a married woman painting, but if 
 a woman has her talent she ought not to give 
 it up, and I shall be only too delighted to 
 make it easier for her this summer by taking 
 all the care from her that I can. I will tell 
 you frankly that I did not expect to like her, 
 but I fell in love with her at first sight." 
 
 " So did I," said Edward.
 
 n. 
 
 " THERE is only one thing in the world 
 more delightful for a man than to have his 
 wife and his sister love each other devotedly, 
 and that is to have them both love him even 
 more devotedly," Edward Davidson decided, 
 after Theodora had been with them for a 
 month. In his heart he was aware that he 
 was not worthy of the affection that these two 
 women lavished upon him, for he was almost 
 as clear-sighted regarding himself as he was 
 concerning others. He knew that, although 
 he was not a bad fellow, he was both indolent 
 and selfish, and he thanked Heaven for giving 
 him charm and an amiable disposition, which 
 were the heritage of his mother's people, since 
 it had denied him the sterling qualities of the 
 Davidsons. " Theodora ought to have been 
 the man," he reflected. " She would have 
 made Marie an exemplary husband." And 
 yet Theodora was very womanly in her intense 
 and somewhat old-fashioned way. Beneath
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 13 
 
 her skillful fingers Marie's work-basket was 
 rapidly emptied, and under her direction the 
 house became immaculately clean. The only 
 thing that Edward regretted in his lot was, 
 that Heaven had given these two charming 
 women but a slight sense of humor, for, al- 
 though they appreciated his most conspicuous 
 sallies, his subtler wit was often lost upon 
 them. And yet, after all, perhaps it was bet- 
 ter as it was, he thought, at least so far as 
 Marie was concerned, for no woman with a 
 sense of humor could have taken him seriously 
 enough to have married him. One cannot 
 have everything in this world, and he felt that 
 he could not afford to have complete sympathy 
 and comprehension. 
 
 As for Theodora herself, she was radiantly 
 happy. Her love for her brother had been 
 the one passion of her life. It had been fos- 
 tered on scant food, and for the last twelve 
 years would have languished had it taken root 
 in less fertile soil, for writing letters chanced 
 to be one of the many things that Ned David- 
 son disliked. When he did write one, how- 
 ever, it was so charming as to give Theodora 
 a warm feeling about the heart, which did not
 
 14 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 quite depart before the next letter came some 
 months later. And now Theodora was under 
 the same roof with her brother! She could 
 help to make his life run more smoothly. 
 She could anticipate his wants. She could 
 ride with him, row with him, drive about the 
 country with him. He had made her welcome 
 to all that was his with the air of a prince. 
 He had given her equal rights in a leaky boat ; 
 he had allowed her to ride Dobbin, a worthy 
 horse that had been bought at a bargain for 
 farm work, or to drive him in the shabby 
 buggy ; he had offered her the hospitality of 
 the tennis-court, a picturesque spot under the 
 spreading elms, where the grass was so long 
 that the white boundaries were indistinct. 
 Theodora, who was a woman of action, had 
 promptly seen to the mending of the boat, and 
 to the rejuvenating of the buggy, and had had 
 the grass cut on the tennis-court and marked 
 out its boundaries with her own hands. No 
 wonder that Edward Davidson found it plea- 
 sant to have the companionship of a sister 
 who loved him ! No wonder that all Edge- 
 comb rejoiced in the coming of Theodora ! 
 She soon gave outsiders reason to rejoice
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 15 
 
 on their own account, for she entered into the 
 good works of the community with zest. She 
 helped get up a fair for the benefit of the new 
 hospital, and she was one of the chief supports 
 of a vacation school. Every one gave her a 
 warm welcome, for the sake of her brother as 
 well as on her own account ; but although she 
 made many stanch friends, she was too inde- 
 pendent and decided to be such a universal 
 favorite as Edward. The people who were 
 not attracted by her were chiefly women who 
 liked to rule, and whose judgment clashed 
 with hers in committee meetings ; but even her 
 enemies agreed that she was greatly needed in 
 her brother's family, where her desire to lead 
 would find its legitimate field. 
 
 Edgecomb was about twenty miles from 
 Boston, and therefore near enough to that me- 
 tropolis to share some of its advantages, and 
 yet far enough away to have its own fashions 
 and standards. Society in the little town 
 was composed of two classes, those persons 
 who went out with the coming of the summer 
 heat and sought refuge at the seashore ; and 
 those who came in with the summer, seeking 
 refuge from the greater heat of the cities. It
 
 16 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 was therefore not as purely feminine a com- 
 munity as one is apt to find in New England ; 
 but the masculine element was composed 
 wholly of the married, the elderly, or the very 
 young. There were plenty of boys, and sev- 
 eral young fellows of twenty or thereabouts 
 at home on a college vacation ; but there was 
 nobody " of the right age for Theodora," as 
 Mrs. Davidson expressed it. 
 
 "Not that it makes any difference," she 
 confided to her husband, " for Theodora 
 does n't like men." 
 
 "Doesn't she?" he asked. "Then she is 
 the first woman I have ever seen who does n't 
 like them. A woman may be too proud or 
 too shy to show it, or so unattractive that men 
 do not like her, but I have never yet seen a 
 woman who in her heart of hearts did not find 
 my sex interesting." 
 
 " You can't look into their heart of hearts," 
 she objected, " and, in common with most men, 
 you think all women are somewhat like your 
 wife, but you must believe me when I tell you 
 that Theodora despises men." 
 
 " Despises them ? Very likely ; that is an- 
 other matter. I only maintain that in her 
 heart of hearts she likes them."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 17 
 
 She certainly liked boys, there could be no 
 doubt upon that score, and she soon had a 
 little circle of friends of the other sex who 
 admired her in a hearty and unqualified fa- 
 shion. Her strength, her freedom from affec- 
 tation, and her skill in playing tennis won their 
 respect. They did not fall in love with her, 
 however. Theodora Davidson was not the 
 kind of woman with whom men fall in love ; at 
 least so her friends said. This was one reason 
 why she was such a favorite with the mothers 
 of sons : they liked her because she was so 
 sensible and so " safe." A young man could 
 gain nothing but good from her, for she was 
 as unsentimental as the fondest mother's heart 
 could wish. Her brother adapted Sylvia's 
 song to her: 
 
 " Who is Theo ? What is she, that mothers all commend 
 
 her? 
 
 Helpful, fair, and wise is she ; 
 The heaven such grace did lend her 
 That she might admired be. 
 
 " Is she kind as she is fair ? Indeed, we think she 's kinder. 
 
 Our dear sons' faults she doth repair, 
 And makes all Edgecomb mind her, 
 And, helping all, inhabits there. 
 
 " Then to Theo let us sing, for Theo is excelling," etc.
 
 18 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 During the summer, Edward and Marie saw 
 far too little of Theodora, for the various fes- 
 tivities that were given in her honor made 
 her, for the time being, a public character. 
 In addition, all her Eastern friends demanded 
 little visits from her, so that she was seldom 
 able to spend a peaceful, unbroken week at 
 home. As the summer drew to a close, her 
 brother and his wife became aware with dis- 
 may that it would soon be time for Theodora 
 to return to her college. They had grown so 
 dependent upon her that they could not bear 
 to think of the wrench of the approaching 
 parting. It was Edward who conceived the 
 idea that there need be no separation. He 
 had found his sister scanning two letters with 
 a perplexed expression. 
 
 "What's the matter, Theo?" he asked 
 lightly. " You look as if you had something 
 on your mind." 
 
 " I have. Here is a letter from the princi- 
 pal of my college saying that she wishes to 
 know whether I mean to return this autumn, 
 as she has heard of some one who could fill my 
 place. She hopes that I may come back, as 
 she would prefer me to any one else, but. she
 
 THE COMING OF THEODOBA. 19 
 
 has heard a rumor to the effect that I mean to 
 stay in the East. I can't think how, as I 
 have never dreamed of such a thing." 
 
 Theodora had felt herself so indispensable 
 in the school that the thought that her position 
 could be filled with so much ease gave her a 
 sharp pang. 
 
 "I have another letter," she continued, 
 "from Rhoda Emerson; you remember, Ed- 
 ward, what a charming little girl she was, and 
 she is even more lovely now ; she wants me 
 to join her in starting a college settlement. 
 If I see my way clear to doing this, she will 
 give up her position as governess, but other- 
 wise she will keep on where she is for another 
 year, as she does not feel that she is suffi- 
 ciently practical to succeed in a college settle- 
 ment alone." 
 
 " Theo, what perfect nonsense it is for you 
 to think of doing either of these things," he 
 cried impulsively. " Of course they all want 
 you, everybody does, but your place is here." 
 
 "They don't all absolutely need me," she 
 said with a little tremor in her voice. " That 
 is just the point ; my place, you see, can be 
 filled in the college. Rhoda needs me, and so,
 
 20 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 although I have never tried that sort of work, 
 I may decide to go to her, and yet I am so 
 fond of teaching and of my scholars that I am 
 inclined " 
 
 " Theo, your place can never be filled here," 
 he broke in. " Marie and I were saying only 
 last night how we should miss you when you 
 went away. I did n't think you could give up 
 your work in the West, but if they can fill 
 your place Theo, my dearest Theo, you 
 have no idea how much good you have done us 
 this summer, and, when these everlasting visits 
 are over and you settle down here, it will be 
 even nicer. Why not live with us always ? A 
 sister's place is surely with her only brother, 
 and Marie will be able to do so much more 
 painting if you are here to help take charge 
 of things. Dearest, I know that your con- 
 science is your strongest point. Consider that 
 it is your duty to stay with us and I am sure 
 we shall keep you." 
 
 Theodora was more touched by her brother's 
 words than she cared to show. Nevertheless 
 she took some days to consider his proposition, 
 an unusual thing with her, as her mind was 
 generally made up at once on all subjects ; but
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 21 
 
 this was a very serious decision, for if she 
 stayed with him it involved renouncing all her 
 old ambitions. She longed to be a power in 
 the world, either through her teaching or by 
 some larger scheme, such as Rhoda Emerson 
 proposed, and it would be a sacrifice, in many 
 ways, to be instead merely a power in one 
 quiet village household. 
 
 When Edward told his wife that he had 
 asked Theodora to live with them permanently 
 she made no comment, but his quick eye 
 caught an added shade of color in her face. 
 
 " Why Marie, don't you like it ? " he asked 
 in distress. " I thought it was just what 
 would please you beyond everything, as you 
 are so fond of Theodora." 
 
 " I am very glad to have her stay, and I do 
 love her dearly." 
 
 " Then what is the trouble ? Out with it, 
 young woman." 
 
 " I was thinking that you might have con- 
 sulted me first, but that was a narrow and 
 selfish feeling," said Marie generously. 
 
 " I did n't have time to consult anybody ; 
 the words sprang to my lips and I couldn't 
 help saying them."
 
 22 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " I am glad she is to be here this winter ; I 
 was only thinking forever is such a long 
 time, Edward, she may get tired of us. 
 Could n't you ask her to spend the winter with 
 us ? " she inquired timidly. 
 
 " My dear, you are as unpractical as the rest 
 of your sex. Theo can't give up teaching for 
 a year and expect to get back her old position. 
 I shouldn't have the face to ask her to live 
 with us merely for a year. No, it must be 
 forever or not at all ; and of the two I vastly 
 prefer forever." 
 
 " So do I," assented Marie. " Where is she ? 
 Let me go to her and beg her to stay with us." 
 
 Theodora finally decided to remain in Edge- 
 comb. She knew that a few years ago she 
 would have made a different decision, but she 
 had begun to hunger for family ties. Her 
 passionate love for her brother, and the cer- 
 tainty that she could be of use to him, out- 
 weighed her larger ambitions. When she told 
 him her determination, he drew her arm 
 through his and kissed her affectionately. " I 
 knew you would n't go back on us, Theo," he 
 observed, " and so I was n't the least little bit 
 uneasy while you were making up your mind."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 23 
 
 Her face glowed with happiness. When it 
 lighted up in that sudden fashion she was 
 beautiful. 
 
 " Edward, you have given me more pleasure 
 by wanting me to live with you than you can 
 imagine. You can't think what it is to me to 
 have a home among my own people, and to be 
 able to be of use to those I love." 
 
 " And a home you shall have with us al- 
 ways," he replied fervently, being in truth 
 greatly touched by her affection; "at least 
 until some other fellow finds out that 
 
 " Theo is excelling 
 Each mortal thing upon the dull earth dwelling." 
 
 " That will never happen," she said firmly. 
 "All the better for us, then," he returned 
 lightly.
 
 III. 
 
 IN September the summer population of 
 Edgecomb began to scatter, while its place 
 was filled by the more permanent winter 
 residents. Among them the two ministers 
 returned, for Edgecomb was divided theolo- 
 gically into liberal conservatives and conser- 
 vative liberals. The Davidsons had a pew in 
 both churches, rather to Edward's amusement. 
 Nathaniel Davidson had been a pillar in the 
 Orthodox Church, and his pew descended 
 to his son, who kept it because he could not 
 bear to hurt the feelings of good old Mr. 
 Thorndyke, the clergyman. On the other 
 hand, Francis Compton, the conservative lib- 
 eral, was his most intimate friend, and so he 
 felt obliged to take a pew in the new church, 
 especially as Marie preferred to go there. 
 Edward, however, disliked to hurt his own feel- 
 ings quite as much as to disturb those of his 
 friends, and therefore his attendance at church 
 was chiefly vicarious. He was glad to have
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 25 
 
 his wife go, for he believed that religion was 
 a good thing, especially for women : poor 
 souls ! they had a sufficiently hard time in life, 
 and it was only fair that they should have all 
 possible alleviations. Theodora chanced to 
 dislike church-going as much as her brother 
 did, and was always ready to stay at home 
 with him and the children on Sunday morn- 
 ing, while Marie went to church and gathered 
 what help she could from the ministrations of 
 Francis Compton. A warm friendship existed 
 between her and the young preacher. It was 
 the kind of friendship that is viewed with 
 equanimity by the most gossiping of neighbors, 
 and with satisfaction by the most jealous of 
 husbands. Edward, however, was far from 
 being a jealous husband. He gloried in the 
 thought that his wife charmed other men, and 
 that, notwithstanding, she should have chosen 
 this same faulty, good-for-nothing Edward 
 Davidson to love and to honor. He did not 
 grudge Compton the overflowings of her large 
 sympathy, poor Compton, whose brilliant 
 young wife had died seven years before, after 
 a brief twelve months of marriage. Ever 
 since the Davidsons had returned from abroad,
 
 26 THE CONING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Compton and his little girl had dined with 
 them once a week, until his vacation had made 
 an interregnum in the pleasant custom, and 
 now that he was at home again it was to be 
 renewed. 
 
 " I am longing to see how you will get on 
 with Frank Compton," Marie said to Theo- 
 dora, as they were putting the finishing 
 touches to the dining-room on the day when 
 their guests were expected. " Of course you 
 will like him, for everybody does, but I am 
 wondering whether you will draw each other 
 out or shut each other up." 
 
 " Judging by the one sermon of his which 
 I have heard, I should say that we shall not 
 have one taste or idea in common. I have no 
 doubt that he is an excellent man," Theodora 
 added, as she noticed the troubled flush on 
 Marie's face, "but I don't particularly take 
 to young ministers. I shall like him, though, 
 because he is Edward's friend." 
 
 " We all feel so sorry for him," continued 
 Marie with a sigh. "His marriage was 
 ideal, and he has had such a hard life ever 
 since his wife died ! He was so wrapped up in 
 her that I am sure he will never marry again,
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 2T 
 
 and so life holds nothing very cheerful for 
 him." 
 
 " He has his child," Theodora suggested. 
 
 " Yes, but he can't get much comfort out of 
 her, for she is a difficult child to manage; a 
 problem in short. She is so mischievous that 
 I don't like her influence on my children, yet 
 I can't let Frank see that I disapprove of 
 her." 
 
 " Why not ? If she has a bad influence 
 over your children, I should tell him frankly 
 that I thought it best that they should see 
 very little of each other." 
 
 " The poor child is so lonely that I have n't 
 the heart to suggest her seeing less of Dora 
 and Gladys, and besides, it would hurt Mr. 
 Compton deeply if he knew that I did not 
 approve of his little girl. It must be terribly 
 hard," she added after a pause, " to have your 
 life all duty, and your chief happiness in the 
 past. The thought of his wife is a great in- 
 spiration to him, and perhaps he could not 
 preach such helpful sermons if he had not 
 suffered." 
 
 Theodora had scant sympathy for a man 
 whose native powers, reinforced by the mein-
 
 28 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 ory of his wife, could accomplish nothing less 
 commonplace than the sermon that she had 
 heard. She did not give voice to this senti- 
 ment, however, but silently followed her sister- 
 in-law into the parlor. 
 
 " Here they come now," said Marie pres- 
 ently, " and Edward is with them." 
 
 As Theodora shook hands with the Rev- 
 erend Francis Compton, she thought that she 
 had never seen so boyish-looking a man of his 
 age. This youthful appearance was accounted 
 for by the extreme delicacy of his complexion, 
 which was as fair as a girl's, and his very 
 blond hair and beardless face ; but it suggested 
 lack of force, and his low voice added to the 
 impression. She quickly made up her mind 
 that there was nothing distinctive about him, 
 but changed her opinion when she looked into 
 his gray eyes, which were on a level with hers. 
 She read candor, sympathy, and extreme 
 refinement in their expression. He did not 
 belong to the class of men that stirred her 
 imagination, but she felt confidence in him at 
 
 o 
 
 once, and she liked him as she would have 
 liked a gentle, sweet-natured girl. 
 
 " Essie, shake hands with Miss Davidson,"
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 29 
 
 he said, turning to his child, whose presence 
 Theodora had forgotten. 
 
 Essie had clasped her hands behind her, 
 but she obeyed her father, and held out a 
 small hand awkwardly and half defiantly. 
 She was a pale, plain little thing, with a mop 
 of straight black hair, and large black eyes, 
 which looked at her new acquaintance with 
 preternatural solemnity as if they were gazing 
 through all outer disguises to her very soul. 
 She was seven years old, as we count age in 
 this world, but she had a quaint shrewdness 
 and an uncanny penetration that made it seem 
 at moments as if the head on those young 
 shoulders had seen ten times seven years in 
 some other planet. She was painfully shy, 
 and Theodora only succeeded in extracting 
 short and frightened replies from her ; but 
 she had, nevertheless, the disconcerting feeling 
 of having been judged and found wanting. 
 It amused her to find that a creature so small 
 and frail could produce such a vivid impres- 
 sion of strong and peculiar personality. 
 
 There was much pleasant talk during din- 
 ner, about local matters, town politics, and 
 literature. Afterwards, while Marie and Ed-
 
 30 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 ward were occupied with the children, Theo- 
 dora and Mr. Coinpton had a few words to- 
 gether. They adjourned to the studio, a 
 room that had been positively obnoxious to 
 Theodora's order-loving soul ever since she 
 had first seen its picturesque confusion. The 
 canvases, bric-a-brac, old carvings, draperies, 
 and plaster casts were arranged, so far as 
 she could see, without method, or regard for 
 anything but a desire to furnish a resting- 
 place for dust. Unanswered letters were lying 
 untidily about on the table, together with 
 Edward's driving-gloves, and Guy's torn straw 
 hat, while the dark covers of the books had 
 taken on a gray complexion. 
 
 " I will show you that passage of which we 
 were speaking," Mr. Compton observed, as he 
 took up one of the volumes. 
 
 " Let me dust it for you," she said, quickly 
 divining in the neat and well-appointed man 
 before her a kindred spirit, so far as dirt and 
 disorder were concerned. She returned pres- 
 ently with a cheese-cloth duster of her own 
 make. 
 
 " Give it to me," he begged. " You will 
 soil that fresh white dress."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 31 
 
 He looked with hearty approval at her spot- 
 less dimity gown, with the blue ribbon around 
 the waist, and then his eyes rested on her blue 
 eyes and brown hair. 
 
 " Do you know you are wonderfully like 
 Edward," he said. 
 
 " It gives me so much pleasure to be 
 thought to look like him," she responded heart- 
 ily. " I can't see the likeness myself, for he is 
 so handsome, and then he is so much lighter 
 in coloring ; but I suppose there is a family 
 resemblance, since every one speaks of it." 
 
 "I wish I could tell you what Edward has 
 been to me," he proceeded with a frank com- 
 radeship of manner that had its charm. " I 
 can only say that there is nobody like him, and 
 this you know already." 
 
 " I do," she replied with enthusiasm. 
 
 " I am so glad to know his sister," he added 
 impulsively, after a little pause. 
 
 " And I am so glad to know his best friend." 
 
 " It is awfully nice that you are to live with 
 them," he went on, " for the one thing, the 
 only thing, that they need is a little more order 
 and system." 
 
 She looked around the studio and gave a
 
 32 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 bright laugh. " You must think that I 
 haven't accomplished much here, but I am 
 biding my time. I have given up doing any- 
 thing in this place while Marie is so hard at 
 work, but is n't the wall-paper dreadful ? " 
 
 The old, soiled wall-paper, of a dingy gray 
 hue, brightened by inconspicuous gilt figures, 
 had been covered in places by gray cartridge- 
 paper roughly tacked up to make a temporary 
 background. 
 
 " Edward has promised to get a new paper," 
 she continued, " but I am afraid he will never 
 do it." 
 
 " What terrible plot are you two people 
 hatching ? " Edward inquired, as he sauntered 
 into the room and threw himself down on the 
 faded blue window-cushion. 
 
 Marie appeared presently with a bowl of 
 nasturtiums, which she put on the untidy table 
 with no apparent consciousness of its disorder. 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Compton," she said, " I have n't 
 told you yet how much I liked your sermon. 
 It was so good to get you back. Your views 
 about truth frightened me a little, however, 
 and made me feel like a lying hypocrite." 
 
 " Come now, Mrs. Davidson, don't praise
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 33 
 
 that particular sermon, or I shall accuse you 
 of hypocrisy. It was written after I had at- 
 tended two funerals, and when I was dead- 
 tired, so it was very poor. I am sure Miss 
 Davidson agrees with me." 
 
 Theodora was silent a moment, trying to find 
 a reply which should combine truth and polite- 
 ness, an exercise in which she was not skilled. 
 
 " I liked the extracts from Emerson im- 
 mensely," she said at last. 
 
 Her brother and Mr. Compton laughed, but 
 Marie seemed disturbed. 
 
 " You are having a glimpse behind the 
 scenes, Theo," Edward remarked. " I dare 
 say you supposed that a minister was like a 
 clock, and that all that was necessary was to 
 wind him up and set him going. He is more 
 like a fire ; sometimes he sparkles and scintil- 
 lates, and sometimes he refuses to kindle." 
 
 " I must confess," Theodora acknowledged, 
 turning to Mr. Compton, " that I have always 
 heretofore thought of a minister as an abstract 
 quantity, a person who belonged in the pulpit. 
 I have not thought of his outside life ; but 
 then I have never known a minister unpro- 
 fessionally."
 
 34 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " In sh^rt, you regard a minister, as you 
 would a ticket-agent or a horse-car conductor, 
 as only existing for official purposes, and at 
 the point where he touches your own life ? " 
 Edward suggested. 
 
 "I shouldn't have thought of making the 
 comparison," Theodora said gravely, not no- 
 ticing the sparkle in her brother's eyes," but I 
 suppose I do think of people in that outside 
 way." 
 
 " Now this is very interesting," said Mr. 
 Compton. " How do you manage to accom- 
 plish it? It must be so restful ! But you have 
 never had to deal with a whole parish." 
 
 " No, but I have had to deal with a large 
 school. Life would be simply intolerable to 
 me if I had to take a personal interest in every 
 one I met," she confessed. " If I treated all 
 the world as if they were my friends, it would 
 seem to make genuine, true f riendship a mock- 
 ery." 
 
 " There is truth for you ! " said Edward. 
 " Can't you preach another sermon about 
 truth and work that in ? " 
 
 Mr. Compton laughed. " You have no idea, 
 Miss Davidson, what interesting suggestions
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 35 
 
 your brother has to offer with regard to ser- 
 mons. I have often wanted to construct one 
 on the lines he indicates. It is a pity that the 
 men with the original fancies are so seldom in 
 the pulpit." 
 
 " If here is n't old Mrs. Fraley," Edward 
 exclaimed at this point. " Good Lord deliver 
 us!" 
 
 He made a hasty retreat, but Marie called 
 after him, " Edward ! It is cruel of you to go 
 off when the poor old thing adores you so." 
 
 " Tell her I adore her, too, but that I want 
 to leave the field clear for Frank. It is 
 against my principles to try to cut out an- 
 other fellow, and Frank is even fonder of her 
 than I am." 
 
 Edward was in the orchard with the children 
 by the time Mrs. Fraley had made her way 
 into the studio ; she always dispensed with the 
 formality of ringing the door-bell. She was a 
 forlorn-looking creature, with a shaking head 
 and a withered hand, and a gown and shawl 
 that were neat but hopelessly shabby. In 
 former years she had done the spring cleaning 
 in the Davidson household, and she was now 
 living, rent free, in a small house that Edward
 
 36 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 owned. She accepted his generosity as a mat- 
 ter of course, and was always finding fault, in 
 her querulous voice, because he did not keep 
 her cottage in better repair. And yet, al- 
 though she felt privileged to scold him freely, 
 she loved him fondly. 
 
 " Why, I thought I see Mr. Eddie at the 
 winder," she said, with such keen disappoint- 
 ment that Marie and Mr. Compton threw 
 themselves into the breach with even more 
 than their accustomed ardor. As for Theodora, 
 she shared her brother's physical repulsion to 
 this woman, as well as his mental aversion to 
 all bores ; but she was so sorry for her that she 
 struggled against her uncharitable feelings, 
 and even went the length of promising to see 
 what could be done about her smoking stove. 
 Marie loaded her down with good things from 
 the larder, and Frank walked home with her 
 to carry her properties, while Essie trotted 
 along by his side like a little dog. 
 
 Edward returned to the studio as soon as 
 the guests had departed. 
 
 " Well, what was it this time ? " he inquired. 
 " New ' winders ' ? Or a new roof ? Or per- 
 haps she would like the house painted ? "
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 37 
 
 " It was just a friendly visit." 
 
 " She mentioned that the stove did n't draw 
 well," Theodora remarked. 
 
 " Poor old stove ! I can sympathize with 
 it, for I don't draw well either. Did she add 
 that it smoked ? If so, we have still more in 
 common. I feel like a twin brother to that 
 stove ! I suppose Marie was as effusive as 
 ever. Theo, I could tell the rank of our vis- 
 itors if I were blind, for Marie's greeting is 
 always in inverse ratio to their importance. 
 If Mrs. Fraley were a duchess, or the queen of 
 England herself, she could not treat her with 
 more distinguished consideration ; whereas she 
 would be a trifle haughty if Queen Victoria 
 were to walk in, and her manner would seem 
 to say, ' You are only a widowed queen, 
 whereas /am the wife of Edward Davidson ! ' 
 As for Frank, I suppose you recognized, Theo- 
 dora, that Mrs. Fraley was his favorite parish- 
 ioner ? They all are. He has what might be 
 called the ministerial manner." 
 
 " How did you like Frank ? " Marie asked 
 Theodora. 
 
 " I think he is very pleasant." 
 
 Marie was troubled by this lack of enthusi-
 
 38 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 asm. " He is more than pleasant. He is very 
 unselfish, and so nice with the children. He 
 has a beautiful nature." 
 
 " I like him very much. I don't think I 
 underrate his attractions ; but I prefer a man 
 who is masculine, even if he has the faults of 
 his sex. He can leave a beautiful nature to 
 women." 
 
 "Theo, my love," said Edward, "I have 
 always admired you, but now I adore you. I 
 have been struggling for the last six months 
 to copy Frank and cultivate a ' beautiful na- 
 ture,' to please my wife. I shall cease now 
 and be my old, unregenerate self, to please my 
 sister." 
 
 After Frank Compton and his little girl 
 had seen Mrs. Fraley home, Essie remarked, 
 " I don't like that lady." 
 
 " My dear, you must try to like her. If 
 you were poor and old and unfortunate " 
 
 " Oh, I don't mean Mrs. Fraley ; I don't 
 mind her. I mean that Miss Davidson." 
 
 " Why don't you like her ? I thought her 
 charming." 
 
 " She was n't charming to me," the child 
 said sullenly.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 39 
 
 " What did she say to my little girl ? " 
 "She asked me what my name was." 
 " I am sure there was no harm in that." 
 " But what came after was the harmful 
 part. I told her ' Essie,' of course, and she 
 said she knew that, but she wanted to call me 
 by my real name, as she did n't like nick- 
 names ; and when I told her it was Estelle she 
 said, 'You have a French name,' as if a 
 French name was wicked ! ' However,' she 
 said, ' I shall call you by it if you don't mind.' 
 I hate her because she did n't like my darling 
 mother's beautiful name." 
 
 " My dear," her father said gently, " she 
 didn't know it was your mother's name." 
 
 " I don't like her, and I don't Want her to 
 call me anything!" the child exclaimed pas- 
 sionately. 
 
 So it will be seen that there was one person 
 in Edgecomb who did not rejoice in the com- 
 ing of Theodora.
 
 IV. 
 
 So long as Theodora was a visitor in her 
 brother's house, her activity was kept in 
 check. Now that she was a permanent part 
 of the family it grew apace, for there was so 
 much, in every direction, to be done, besides 
 a number of things that needed to be undone. 
 Marie was hard at work on a portrait of her 
 handsome neighbor, Mrs. Shimmin, that was 
 to be finished by the first of October, when the 
 Shimmins returned to New York, and so the 
 housekeeping was of a more than ordinarily 
 defective kind, while the picture grew in the 
 opposite direction, and became each day a 
 better representation of its beautiful original. 
 In the studio, Marie was more charming than 
 at any other time. She looked as young and 
 fresh as a school-girl, as she stood before her 
 easel, enveloped in a big blue apron, with her 
 paint-brush in her hand, and her pretty head 
 tilted thoughtfully to one side, too intent upon 
 her work to be conscious of her charms. She
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 41 
 
 never looked so lovable and dear, and Theo- 
 dora was often seized with the unseemly wish 
 to throw her arms about her and kiss her, a 
 desire which she was too considerate to gratify. 
 The children were less thoughtful, and Marie 
 was often interrupted in her work by the 
 clasp of a small hand, and a little upturned 
 face that begged for " just one kiss, mamma." 
 Theodora wondered at her unvarying sweet- 
 ness and patience with these troublesome little 
 comforts. There were other interruptions that 
 were less agreeable. 
 
 " I wish I did n't have to think about 
 breakfasts and dinners ! " Marie cried in de- 
 spair one morning, when the butcher appeared 
 just as her work was well under way. 
 
 " Let me see him for you," said Theodora, 
 who was entertaining the model. " What 
 shall I order?" 
 
 " Anything you like. Perhaps you can find 
 up a new animal. We have had beef, mutton, 
 and chickens until I 'm tired of the sight of 
 them." 
 
 It was after this opening that Theodora 
 proposed taking charge of the housekeeping 
 until Marie's press of work should be over.
 
 42 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Marie gratefully accepted the offer. She had 
 always disliked housekeeping, and it was a com- 
 fort to put it out of her mind for a few weeks 
 and devote herself wholly to painting. Theo- 
 dora could not resist making a few changes in 
 the ways of the household. Under Mrs. Da- 
 vidson's management there had been lazy com- 
 fort, and an easy elasticity in the hours of the 
 meals, especially in the morning, when the 
 family came to breakfast late or early, accord- 
 ing to their vagrant or punctual desires. 
 There was a profusion of food at one time, 
 with little variety the next day, and a careless- 
 ness as to table etiquette, but much thought 
 concerning dainty china and a centre-piece of 
 flowers. Theodora could recall one dinner of 
 bacon and eggs and baked potatoes, with a 
 dessert of canned peaches and crackers, an 
 improvised affair that occurred on Labor Day, 
 for Marie had forgotten that a holiday was 
 coming and had neglected to lay in supplies. 
 Some Boston friends had chanced to drop in, 
 and Marie had urged them to stay to lunch- 
 eon, as she called it, with charming cordial- 
 ity, feeling happily confident that what the 
 meal lacked in solids was made up for by a
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 43 
 
 graceful bunch of goldenrod and asters in the 
 centre of the table. 
 
 Under Miss Davidson's supervision the 
 general average of the food improved, and less 
 money was spent on the marketing. The ta- 
 ble was waited upon in the most approved 
 way, not that Theodora cared a straw for 
 fashion, but because she felt that order and 
 method simplified life. In the West she had 
 kept house and taken girls to board, besides 
 teaching, and she therefore had a practical 
 knowledge of every kind of work. She grad- 
 ually brought about greater promptness at 
 meals, and in many little ways she made her 
 presence felt. She loved the dear old house 
 too well to attempt any radical changes in it, 
 but she had the dilapidated white paint cov- 
 ered by a new coating of white, and a new 
 fence took the place of the old one with the 
 broken palings. In her zeal for improvement 
 she even attacked the family lot at the ceme- 
 tery, which for some years had been left en- 
 tirely to its own devices, so that weeds and tall 
 grass disputed possession with the vines and 
 flowers. 
 
 One afternoon, in the end of September,
 
 44 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Theodora went by appointment to the ceme- 
 tery to meet the gardener who was to renovate 
 the Davidson lot. He was late, as work- 
 people always were in Edgecomb, but she 
 could never get used to this laxity regarding 
 time, and so had been prompt to the moment. 
 Theodora was too healthy-minded, and too bent 
 upon the practical aspect of her errand, to be 
 saddened or greatly impressed by her sur- 
 roundings ; but she had a sensation of peace, 
 and she took a physical pleasure in the soft 
 stir of the pine-scented wind. How quiet it 
 was ! The cemetery seemed worthy of its name, 
 " a sleeping-place." It was on the brow of a 
 little hill which rose in its soft slope of grass 
 above the narrow country road. Tall pines 
 and graceful elms and maples were scattered 
 about within the friendly inclosure, keeping 
 faithful watch above the silent homes of the 
 dead in the quiet " white village." She 
 looked half absently at the inscription on the 
 headstone that marked her father's grave, and 
 wondered, as she had often done before, why 
 her brother had not called his son Nathaniel 
 Bradlee, a name that had been borne with dis- 
 tinction not only by their father, but also by
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 45 
 
 their grandfather and great-grandfather. At 
 last she grew impatient, for fifteen minutes 
 had passed and the gardener was not in sight. 
 She began to pace the narrow walk restlessly, 
 and to read the familiar Edgecomb names on 
 the monuments, in as friendly neighborhood 
 in death as their owners had been in life. 
 
 "'Phillips,' 'Fraley,' ' Reycroft,' ' Comp- 
 ton ' ' she paused. There was only one green 
 mound in that lot and a very simple headstone. 
 She read the inscription on its white surface : 
 
 Here lies Estelle, 
 
 daughter of 
 
 David Murray and Elizabeth Gray, 
 
 And beloved wife of Francis Compton. 
 
 Born Sept. 27th, 18. Died Dec. 25th, 18. 
 
 Aged 22 years, 2 months, and 28 days. 
 
 " Poor young thing," Theodora thought, 
 with a rush of compassion ; " she was only 
 twenty-two years old when she died ! " 
 
 She read the lines over again, and the 
 word " beloved " jarred upon her, for she did 
 not like any public expression of feeling, and 
 yet she was more sorry for Francis Comp- 
 ton than she had ever been before. As she
 
 46 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 thoughtfully walked back to her own lot, she 
 saw a dark figure in the distance and hastened 
 forward, expecting to greet the gardener, but 
 presently she recognized Mr. Compton. His 
 little girl was with him ; she had hold of one 
 of his hands, and he carried a bunch of fringed 
 gentians in the other. 
 
 " Good afternoon, Miss Davidson," he said ; 
 " we are here, it seems, on similar errands." 
 
 " I have come to see that our family lot is 
 put in thorough order," she returned, vexed 
 at the inappropriateness of her words, and yet 
 not able at the moment to think of anything 
 else to say. 
 
 " It is my wife's birthday," he said simply, 
 " and so I have brought these flowers here." 
 
 There was in his tone a quiet taking for 
 granted of her comprehension of his frame of 
 mind. 
 
 An unprecedented shyness seized Theodora. 
 "That is very pleasant," she said vaguely. 
 She had never felt so hopelessly out of her 
 element. 
 
 "It is not pleasant; it is very sad," said 
 Essie in her shrill treble. 
 
 Theodora had not heard the child speak
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 47 
 
 since the day when they had first met, and 
 she could hardly have been more surprised 
 if a voice had come from one of the silent 
 graves. 
 
 She could not help smiling as she looked 
 down into the defiant dark eyes. Poor Essie 
 was covered with confusion as soon as the 
 words were uttered, but that smile added the 
 sting of an insult to her former sense of in- 
 jury- 
 Theodora was not sensitive to atmosphere, 
 
 and she was entirely unconscious of the hos- 
 tility that she aroused in the little girl. " Of 
 course it is very sad that your mamma has 
 died," she said gently, " but it is pleasant that 
 you can come here with your papa." 
 
 " I try to come here every week," Mr. 
 Compton stated. " It seems to put me in a 
 better frame of mind for writing my sermons." 
 
 The practical Theodora thought that his 
 sermons would have been better if he had 
 found his inspiration in helping the living; 
 and yet he had so much simplicity, and there 
 was such a boyish frankness about him, that 
 she could not find it in her heart to criticise 
 him severely.
 
 48 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Mr. Compton went on to his own lot with 
 his little girl, and, as the tardy gardener pres- 
 ently made his appearance, Theodora was at 
 once engrossed in the business of the hour. 
 She had just decided to have a certain tree 
 cut down, when she was interrupted by Fran- 
 cis Compton. 
 
 " That little hemlock must stay," he said 
 with vivacity. " Your brother never would 
 forgive you if you had it cut down." 
 
 " But it is such a scrubby little hemlock," 
 she objected, " and it makes too much shade." 
 
 " It makes the charm of the whole place. 
 Miss Davidson, I shall never like you any 
 more, I shall think you an objectionable Phil- 
 istine, if you have that tree cut down." 
 
 " I don't like ugly little trees," she said, 
 half inclined to prove that she always had her 
 own way by giving the obnoxious order at 
 once, and half won over by his words. 
 
 " But this is a beautiful, artistic little tree," 
 he protested ; " and you certainly must like 
 robins, whatever you think of hemlocks. 
 There is a robin that builds its nest there 
 every year, and Essie and I take such pleasure 
 in watching the young families. At least
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 49 
 
 wait until you have consulted your brother," 
 he entreated, as she still hesitated. 
 
 " Very well, I will wait." 
 
 He lingered to make sure that she did not 
 commit any other atrocities, but soon found 
 that her taste for the most part was excellent. 
 She loved all beautiful things, and she even 
 let association glorify some ugly things, but 
 she did not allow for other people's associa- 
 tions ; the little hemlock-tree had not been in 
 the lot when she was a girl. 
 
 Mr. Compton waited to walk home with 
 her, in spite of some whispered remarks from 
 his daughter. 
 
 " It is odd that Gray should have left the 
 best verse out of his elegy," he said as they 
 turned towards home. 
 
 " You mean the one about the robins ? 
 Please say it ; I have forgotten it." 
 
 " ' There scattered oft the earliest of the year, 
 By hands unseen, are showers of violets found. 
 The redbreast loves to build and warble there, 
 And little footsteps lightly print the ground.' " 
 
 " It is beautiful," she assented, " but it has 
 less thought in it than the other verses." 
 
 " Miss Davidson, do you believe in ' the
 
 50 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 village Hampden ' and in ' the mute, inglori- 
 ous Milton ' ? " he asked. 
 
 "No, most emphatically, for we are all 
 given a chance to show what is in us, and if 
 we have grit enough we are sure to succeed. 
 Genius implies grit, and therefore genius can- 
 not be extinguished by any obstacles. A 
 Milton can never be mute." 
 
 " You care a great deal for visible achieve- 
 ment," he said. He and Theodora had grown 
 to be very good friends in these autumn weeks, 
 and he had a habit, when with her, of saying 
 whatever lay below the surface of his thought. 
 " I am not judging merely by what you say 
 now," he went on, " but I have often noticed 
 that you underrate those people who to outward 
 seeming have not succeeded, whereas personal 
 influence is such a subtle thing that failure 
 cannot be judged by tangible tests alone. 
 Your brother, for instance, has not done 
 much in the way of actual work, but I don't 
 know any one who is more of a help to others, 
 with his cheery sympathy and his " 
 
 " My brother will accomplish great things 
 some day," she broke in. " One of my chief 
 reasons for being glad to live with him is that
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 51 
 
 I hope to rouse him to a sense of responsibil- 
 ity about his unusual talents. He loves ease 
 too much. I would not say this to any one 
 but you." 
 
 He was silent, and Theodora presently 
 turned the conversation into another channel. 
 When they reached the parsonage he told 
 Essie to run in to her nurse. She gave an 
 angry glance at Miss Davidson and whispered 
 something to her father. 
 
 " Go in like a good little girl," he said. " I 
 have a parishioner I ought to see at the other 
 end of the town, so I will walk home with 
 Miss Davidson, but I will get back before you 
 have y6ur tea." 
 
 "You must have had an unusually fortu- 
 nate life," he began, as they walked on to- 
 gether, " for otherwise you would have more 
 charity for ' the inglorious Miltons.' You 
 cannot understand how hard it is to accom- 
 plish anything if one has an indolent or a 
 self-distrustful temperament, or if one has had 
 a crushing blow." 
 
 "Can't I?" 
 
 There was something in her tone that made 
 him say hastily,
 
 52 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " I beg your pardon." 
 
 "You need not beg my pardon. If it in- 
 terests you to know it, I am willing to own 
 that any success I have attained has been won 
 in spite of a blow that almost crushed the 
 youth out of me when I was a girl." 
 
 His face instantly grew sympathetic. " I 
 am so sorry," he said heartily. 
 
 " I am very happy now," she added quickly. 
 
 " So it has all come out right ? I am glad 
 of that." 
 
 " I thought you understood to what I al- 
 luded. I thought everybody knew what a 
 great trial our father's second marriage was 
 to Edward and me." 
 
 " Edward always gave me the impression 
 that his step-mother was rather a fascinating 
 woman," he said with some hesitation. 
 
 " Fascinating ! Perhaps she was fascinating 
 to men, but she was Never mind her, we 
 will talk of something pleasanter." 
 
 " She was not much older than Edward, I 
 believe?" 
 
 "No. She was twenty-one when my fa- 
 ther married her, and I was sixteen. I hated 
 her from the very beginning ! " she cried pas-
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 53 
 
 sionately. " I hated the way in which she 
 flirted with Edward, but I never dreamed for 
 a moment that she was bent upon captivating 
 my father." 
 
 As Theodora went on with her tale she 
 grew eloquent over the recapitulation of her 
 wrongs. The girl whom her father married 
 was her music-teacher, Edith Mortimer by 
 name, a pretty little thing, with a pair of ap- 
 pealing dark eyes and some very fascinating 
 dimples. She was, according to Theodora, a 
 young woman whose bright eyes were fixed on 
 the main chance, and she was only too willing 
 to exchange a very humble home for the roof 
 of the elderly but rich widower. 
 
 There were some things that Theodora 
 could not tell in detail, which in fact she tried 
 not to remember. There had been a bitter 
 scene when Mr. Davidson had called his 
 daughter to him and told her that he was 
 going to marry Edith Mortimer. Theodora, 
 who was white and trembling, had said pite- 
 ously that she knew it could not be true, and 
 then he had replied very gently that he had 
 thought his daughter would enjoy having a 
 companion.
 
 54 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Theodora, dumb with anger, had scornfully 
 fixed her eyes on her father. It was hard 
 enough to admit that he wanted to marry 
 again, but she despised him for taking shelter 
 behind such a falsehood. 
 
 " That is not true," she said when she 
 found her voice. "You know that I hate 
 her. She is a scheming, cold-hearted wo- 
 man." 
 
 The two had stood facing each other angrily, 
 curiously alike in feature and in dogged deter- 
 mination. At last he said, "Theodora, you 
 must unsay those words. She is a lovely wo- 
 man, and I want you to be kind to her, as she 
 is to be your mother. 
 
 " My mother ! " she started at the word. 
 
 " It will be a great advantage for you to 
 have some one to take the care of the house," 
 he continued, reverting to commonplaces. 
 
 "Have I not' kept house well, father?" 
 she asked. " I will try so hard to please you ; 
 I will give up going to college ; I will live with 
 you always. Father, if you will only give up 
 this marriage I will do anything, everything. 
 How can you marry that woman, whom I 
 hate, when you think of my mother ? How
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 55 
 
 can you marry her ? Give it up, father, for 
 my sake," she entreated ; " oh, give it up." 
 
 The answer came with quick decision, " I 
 cannot, my word is pledged." 
 
 Then Theodora, after more vain pleading, 
 told her father that he must choose between 
 Edith Mortimer and herself. If he married 
 she should go away from home at once, and 
 never live under his roof again. 
 
 He had replied sternly, " Very well, Theo- 
 dora." 
 
 The memory of those days was so painful 
 that, even in going over the bare facts, her 
 face grew hard and rigid. She told of her 
 abrupt departure from home the very next 
 day, after a scene with her brother, who tried 
 to shake her determination. 
 
 " Edward was almost as much troubled as 
 I was," she said. " But he is made of differ- 
 ent stuff. He always wants to compromise ; 
 and when he found father was determined to 
 carry out his pui^pose, he adapted himself, as 
 well as he could, to the new conditions. Pie 
 was in college then, and was only at home on 
 his vacations." 
 
 " And you went at once to college ? "
 
 56 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Did you never forgive your father ? Did 
 you never come home ? " 
 
 " No. How could I ? " 
 
 " It was a hard position, certainly, but I 
 think you were wrong." 
 
 ' Wrong ? " she repeated. His manner was 
 so courteous, and his voice so gentle, that she 
 felt she had not heard aright. 
 
 "Yes, wrong. I think you ought to have 
 come home in the vacations and made the best 
 of things." 
 
 ' With that woman sitting in my mother's 
 place?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Why do you think I was wrong ? " 
 
 " Because your father had a right to marry 
 again if he chose." 
 
 " It seemed so unnatural that he should for- 
 get my lovely, saintly mother in three years, 
 and marry that little creature, who was a bit 
 of tinsel instead of pure gold. How could he 
 love her? How could he love any one again?" 
 
 "That is hard for me to understand," he 
 admitted. "When a marriage has been a 
 true one, I cannot understand how a man can
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 57 
 
 love twice. I can understand his marrying 
 again, if he is lonely, or for the sake of his 
 children. And yet it happens frequently." 
 
 "But one does not expect one's father to 
 be an average man. One expects him to be 
 constant and fine." 
 
 "You are too hard upon him. He must 
 have suffered very much in being separated 
 from you," he suggested presently. 
 
 " It was his own choice." 
 
 " I beg your pardon. It was your choice ; 
 a choice that you forced on him. And you 
 never saw him again ? " 
 
 " No. They left Edgecomb some years be- 
 fore his death. When he was dying she sent 
 for me, but she sent too late." Her voice 
 sank at the words. 
 
 " It was a tragedy. No wonder that you 
 resented my supposing that you had never suf- 
 fered. I am far more sorry for you than I 
 seem to be ; I did not mean to be unsympa- 
 thetic, but I could not help saying that I 
 thought you in the wrong. Will you forgive 
 my plain speaking ? " 
 
 Theodora fixed her clear eyes upon him. 
 "I will forgive anything but an untruth. If
 
 58 THE CONING OF THEODORA. 
 
 you had let me think that you approved of 
 what I did, while in reality you were con- 
 demning me, I should not have forgiven you." 
 
 " You are exacting. Do you always demand 
 the whole truth from your friends?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "You give it in return," and a smile played 
 about his lips at the recollection of some of 
 her remarks. " By the way, I am going to 
 preach another sermon with extracts of Emer- 
 son in it, which I hope you will like." 
 
 She had not sufficient pliability to turn 
 easily from her tragic memories to another 
 subject, and besides she took him seriously. 
 
 " You care too much whether you please 
 people with your sermons or not," she said 
 bluntly. " It is very natural ; indeed, I con- 
 sider you quite humble when I remember that 
 you are the centre of interest in a small New 
 England town," she added with a smile. " I 
 suppose in this quiet little place it must be 
 hard not to get absorbed in the details of your 
 profession, weddings, and funerals, and ser- 
 mons, and parish calls." 
 
 He laughed outright. " Really, Miss David- 
 son, sermons, and weddings, and funerals, and
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 59 
 
 parish calls may be insignificant trifles, but 
 if you leave these ' details,' as you call them, 
 out of a minister's life, there is n't much left." 
 
 She was vexed by his manner. " I only 
 meant that if you were burning with the mes- 
 sage you had to give, you would have no time 
 to worry over the way in which it was given ; 
 and if your heart were sufficiently in the 
 parish calls, it would be no effort to make 
 them." 
 
 Theodora always had a ready-made judg- 
 ment about everything and everybody, but, 
 like other ready-made articles, it did not al- 
 ways fit. In the present case she was far 
 from having taken the correct measure of her 
 companion. He had too little vanity or too 
 much humor to be hurt by her words, and 
 bade her good-by at her gate in a friendly 
 spirit. 
 
 "Mrs. Underwood is really very ill," he 
 said with a smile ; " so I trust you will approve 
 of my going to see her." 
 
 She had recovered her poise and smiled 
 back at him. " It was abominably rude of me 
 to criticise you as I did. I am very sorry, 
 but thinking about that terrible part of my
 
 60 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 life completely upset me. Will you forgive 
 me?" 
 
 " The only thing I can never forgive in 
 my friends is lack of truth," he quoted mis- 
 chievously. " If you had made me think 
 you approved of me, while in reality you 
 were condemning me, I could not have for- 
 given you."
 
 V. 
 
 IN October Theodora achieved a triumph. 
 After Mrs. Shimmin's portrait was finished 
 she induced Marie and Edward to go on a 
 driving-journey through Berkshire, while she 
 contentedly stayed at home to take care of the 
 children. It was a satisfaction to have these 
 curly-headed, engaging little beings entirely 
 dependent upon her. She devoutly wished 
 that the younger ones were not called by such 
 fancy names as Gladys and Guy. She was 
 sure that it was her sister-in-law's taste ; and, 
 after all, what else could be expected from a 
 woman whose parents had set the example by 
 calling her Marie? Even Theodora's own 
 namesake had her good, old-fashioned name 
 contracted to Dora, which had a weak sound. 
 However, the children did not seem at all 
 repressed by their appellations, but were as 
 mischievous, and had as constant a tendency 
 to soil their pinafores, as if they had been 
 plain Mary and John.
 
 62 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 During the absence of her brother and his 
 wife, Theodora, among other things, found 
 time to rearrange and clean the studio thor- 
 oughly, as well as to look over some family 
 letters that had been stored in the barn ever 
 since the days of her grandfather. She also 
 turned a little storeroom upstairs into a com- 
 fortable den for Edward. Everything was in 
 readiness before the end of the fortnight, and 
 she awaited the return of the travelers with 
 impatience. 
 
 They came back in excellent spirits. The 
 weather had been perfect, they had met charm- 
 ing people, and the trip had been in every way 
 a great success. 
 
 " And we could n't have taken it, dear Theo- 
 dora, if it had n't been for you," said Marie 
 gratefully. 
 
 " It was only a pleasure to stay here," Theo- 
 dora returned. " And now I want you to 
 come into the studio and see what I have done 
 there," she added proudly. 
 
 " You have n't done anything to the studio ! " 
 said Edward in consternation. " Efficient be- 
 ing ! was n't it enough for you to have the 
 house painted, the buggy renovated, and the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 63 
 
 barn altered ? Was n't it enough to spruce 
 up the resting-place of the dead Davidsons 
 without sprucing up the working-place of their 
 descendants ? " 
 
 " Come and see for yourself what I have 
 done," said Theodora with a smile. "You 
 know you always approve of my alterations 
 after you are used to them." 
 
 She opened the door into the studio as she 
 spoke. At the first glance Edward saw that 
 it had wholly changed its character. It was 
 a prim room now, exquisitely neat, charming 
 in a way, for Theodora had good taste, with a 
 certain flavor of quaintness about it ; a room, 
 in short, which seemed the fitting shrine for 
 some dainty maiden lady, some Miss Davidson 
 of bygone times, but not a comfortable work- 
 ing-place for a poor, average, clumsy man and 
 his busy wife. 
 
 " Well, you 've done it now, Theodora," he 
 said. 
 
 " Done what ? Don't you think it is pretty ? " 
 she asked anxiously. 
 
 " Adorably, deliciously pretty. I was merely 
 admiring your taste." 
 
 " You see that I have taken away those dull-
 
 64 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 blue hangings," she went on. " They were 
 charming- in color, but they were too faded and 
 spotted to stay up any longer ; and I hope you 
 like the dotted-muslin window-curtains that I 
 have substituted for them. I made them my- 
 self." 
 
 " Have you burned up the hangings ? " Ed- 
 ward inquired in a subdued voice. 
 
 " Oh, no ; I have made two lovely cushions 
 out of the best part of them. You can see 
 them over there in the window ; and was n't it 
 wonderful that I was able to match them so 
 well in the new covers for the cushions on the 
 window-seats ? " 
 
 " I would have given a great deal if you 
 had found it convenient to save those hangings 
 intact," said Edward. "They were full of 
 associations." 
 
 " I am sorry, dear, but I did n't see the as- 
 sociations and I did see the spots ; and, be- 
 sides, now you will have the added association 
 that your sister made them into cushions. I 
 could n't remember just how the things went 
 before, and I have tried to arrange them with 
 a little more system. You see I have had 
 that chest of drawers brought down from the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 65 
 
 spare room, so that all the odds and ends can 
 be put in it. Do you see how exactly I have 
 matched the cushions in getting the ribbon to 
 tie back the curtains ? And I hope you like 
 the new paper ? I got plain gray cartridge- 
 paper, because I supposed, from your having it 
 tacked up in part of the room, that you pre- 
 ferred it to anything else." 
 
 " That was very thoughtful of you," said 
 Marie with an effort. " And what a pretty 
 rug ! Where did that come from ? " 
 
 " That is a present from me. Mrs. Shim- 
 min and I chose it together." 
 
 How could these sweet-tempered young 
 people, with an almost abnormal dislike to 
 hurting the feelings of their friends, do any- 
 thing but praise her work? And yet, when 
 they were left together in the studio while 
 Theodora went to see about tea, Edward 
 groaned : " It 's awfully pretty, but we shall 
 never dare to make a mess here again. How 
 could she have the floor shellacked? And, 
 Heaven help us ! does she think the one object 
 of a studio is to have its properties put neatly 
 away?" , 
 
 " The rug is lovely, and so are the new win-
 
 66 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 dow-cushions ; I am very glad to have them ; 
 but, oh, Edward ! I had dreamed of a dull-red 
 wall-paper." 
 
 " Yes, I know, dear, and so had I." 
 
 " But think how much worse it might have 
 been ! " Marie suggested cheerfully. " She 
 might have put on a dull-blue paper, that 
 seems to be her favorite color, and then we 
 could not have worked here at all." 
 
 " No, she could n't have done that, for that 
 would have been downright stupid, and Theo- 
 dora is n't stupid." 
 
 "How I hate those dotted-muslin window- 
 curtains ! " said poor Marie ; " but it is a mercy 
 she did n't put them at the north window. 
 Oh, dear! I shall feel homesick here, and I 
 can't paint in a room where I don't feel at 
 home ; but the rug is lovely, and her inten- 
 tions were so good." 
 
 "That's just the trouble," said Edward. 
 
 " Hush ! she is coming." 
 
 "You really like it, don't you? " Theodora 
 asked anxiously. " Of course you can change 
 things about as much as you please, if I have 
 ' spruced up,' as you call it, too much." 
 
 " It 's awfully kind of you to permit that,"
 
 THE COMING OF THEODOBA. 67 
 
 Edward observed ; then, as her face fell, he 
 added quickly : "Of course we shall like it, 
 only only I shall never dare to smoke 
 among all these dainty things." 
 
 " I am glad of that," Theodora assented 
 promptly, " for I have noticed that when you 
 smoke, the dining-room is permeated with the 
 odor, for it goes through the cracks of the 
 folding-doors ; so I have arranged a charming 
 den for you upstairs, a real man's den, without 
 a pretty thing in it ; and I have had the old 
 desk moved down from the attic ; and I have 
 sorted out the most valuable letters from one 
 of the barrels in the barn, and have burned 
 up the others, and I am going to get you to 
 help me with the rest of them, and when we 
 have sorted them all " 
 
 " Satan finds some mischief still for busy 
 hands to do," quoted Edward. " Theodora, I 
 wish you had n't burned any of those letters ; 
 you know I have always meant to write a life 
 of our great-grandfather some time." 
 
 " But you never would have had the pa- 
 tience to look through the letters, and now, as 
 soon as you and I have sorted the rest of 
 them, you can begin on the life at once."
 
 68 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Unfortunately Edward Davidson strongly 
 objected to beginning any work at once. He 
 liked to have a number of projects in his 
 future horizon, castles in the air, that he 
 could build in any style of architecture he 
 pleased, provided he was not obliged to per- 
 petuate them in the substantial form which 
 achievement implies. He saw a dreary series 
 of probabilities stretching out before him. 
 
 " Theo," he asked, " are all the women in 
 the West as energetic as you are ? " 
 
 " Yes, and a great deal more so." 
 
 " The East is good enough for me," he 
 murmured. 
 
 After tea Mr. Compton dropped in to greet 
 the travelers, and was shown into the studio, 
 where the family had assembled. 
 
 " You see, Frank, that we are thoroughly 
 reconstructed," Edward remarked, after they 
 had gone through with the first greetings." 
 
 " How charming the room is ! " said Frank. 
 " I am so unobserving that at first I did n't 
 notice the new curtains and wall-paper, al- 
 though I saw that there was less of a fewer 
 things around." 
 
 " It is Theodora who has transformed us."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 69 
 
 " I guessed as much." 
 
 He gave her a quick glance of approval 
 that irritated both Marie and Edward, who 
 considered it a mark of Philistinism to put 
 primness and spotless neatness above charm 
 and comfort. 
 
 However, Francis Compton was in a mood 
 to appreciate to the utmost the immaculate 
 perfection of this room, for he was fresh from 
 an encounter with an untidy housemaid. He 
 had a feminine love of beauty and neatness, 
 joined to a masculine ignorance as to the best 
 means of obtaining them. His sister had 
 kept house for him until she was married, but 
 for the past two years he had passed through 
 a series of domestic misfortunes. 
 
 " How I envy you people ! " he said with a 
 little sigh. " I have had chaos at my house 
 all the week. My study is either so dusty 
 that I can't stay in it, or else they are sweep- 
 ing it when I want to write my sermon ; and 
 as for the cook Mrs. Davidson," he asked 
 in appealing tones, "can you please tell me 
 how to prevent grease from coming on the top 
 of soup?" 
 
 " I should think that was a very simple
 
 70 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 matter," said Ned. "I should give up soup 
 altogether, Fanny, my love." " Fanny" was 
 his favorite nickname for his friend when he 
 was absorbed in these household details. 
 
 Theodora came to the rescue, and discussed 
 cooking with their guest to his heart's con- 
 tent, greatly to the amusement of her brother. 
 
 " What should you do, Ned," Mr. Comp- 
 ton inquired at last, " if you had a housekeeper 
 who would never give you your breakfast until 
 half past eight?" 
 
 " I should fall down and kiss the hem of 
 her garment. I have one who insists upon 
 giving me mine at half past seven. Suppose 
 we change housekeepers ? " he added airily, 
 but a furious blush on Frank's part, and an 
 indignant glance from Theodora, warned him 
 that he had gone too far. " On the whole, I 
 could n't give mine up," he added ; " and 
 besides, she has promised to live with me 
 always." 
 
 Marie had already begun to have moments 
 of regretting that this was the case. She 
 hardly dared to breathe the thought, even to 
 herself, Theodora was so good, and such a 
 prop in the household ; yet she could not help
 
 THE COMING OF THEODOBA. 71 
 
 an occasional bitter twinge of jealousy when 
 she acknowledged the superiority of her sister- 
 in-law's management. Marie had been as 
 anxious to be rid of housekeeping as Henry 
 the Second was to be delivered from Thomas 
 a Becket, only to find, when it was too late, 
 like the remorseful king, that she would give 
 worlds to recall her hasty words. Of course 
 it would have been an easy matter to resume 
 the housekeeping, now that she had returned 
 rested and refreshed from Berkshire ; but 
 Marie dreaded the disapproval of the ser- 
 vants, who so evidently preferred their new 
 mistress, and a sense of her own incompetency 
 weighed her down. It did not occur to Theo- 
 dora to offer to relinquish the care of the 
 house, when Marie had seemed so delighted at 
 the thought of giving it up ; she was waiting 
 for some suggestion from her. 
 
 Marie was ill and wretchedly out of spirits 
 during the early part of the winter, and her 
 sense of incapacity and uselessness increased, 
 for she had to give up her painting, which in 
 these days was all that kept alive her self- 
 respect. She was extremely reserved, and did 
 not open her heart, even to Edward, whose
 
 72 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 pleasure in his sister's society she would not 
 spoil. She still loved Theodora, but her illu- 
 sions concerning her were dispelled, and she 
 had consequently a sense of irremediable loss 
 and disappointment, which seemed, for the 
 moment, to leave little behind it. Where had 
 it all gone? Marie asked herself piteously 
 before the winter was over, her passionate 
 delight in her sister-in-law's mere physical 
 presence, in her tall, straight figure, and her 
 frank, blue eyes and smooth, brown hair ? 
 There was a time when she had taken a keen 
 enjoyment in the tones of her cheerful voice, 
 and now none of these things quickened her 
 pulses ; on the contrary, she was cold and 
 apathetic when Theodora appeared, and some- 
 times she felt ashamed that it should be so 
 sometimes her sister-in-law's very attractions 
 aroused in her a feeling of antagonism. She 
 had idealized her in the beginning, and now 
 she was paying the penalty, and underestimat- 
 ing her to make the balance even.
 
 VI. . 
 
 IN February the Davidson children were 
 made happy by the arrival of a little brother. 
 They had been spending the day with Essie 
 Compton, and when they came home in the 
 afternoon they were greeted with the good 
 news. They were allowed to go upstairs to 
 the dressing-room, that opened out of their 
 mother's room, and there they saw a small 
 bundle of blankets in the nurse's arms. A 
 very red, wrinkled little face peered out of the 
 wraps. 
 
 The children looked at the baby in silence 
 for a moment. 
 
 "He isn't very pretty, is he, Aunt Theo- 
 dora ? " observed Dora at last. 
 
 " I wish he had come in a larger size," said 
 poor Guy, who had been hoping for a brother 
 old enough for a playfellow. 
 
 " He will grow very fast," said Dora, with 
 the wisdom of six. 
 
 " But I want him in a larger size right off 
 now."
 
 74 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 "What's his name, Aunt Theodora?" 
 asked Gladys. 
 
 " Nathaniel Bradlee Davidson." 
 
 " Do you think that is a very pretty name, 
 Aunt Theodora?" Gladys ventured. She 
 had inherited her mother's desire to please. 
 
 " I am fond of it, because my great-grand- 
 father he is your great-great-grandfather, 
 children was named Nathaniel Bradlee Da- 
 vidson, and so was his son, and so was my 
 father, and consequently it seems the best 
 name in the world to me." 
 
 Theodora took the small bundle from the 
 nurse's arms with a sudden gesture of tender- 
 ness. 
 
 " You dear little thing ! " she exclaimed. 
 " I am so glad there is to be another Nathaniel 
 Bradlee Davidson. The first one was a gen- 
 eral in the Revolutionary War, and my grand- 
 father was a doctor, and your grandfather was 
 a judge. It is a great thing to have come 
 of a long line of God-fearing and law-abiding 
 ancestors, children, and we ought all of us to 
 be ashamed of ourselves if we do not accom- 
 plish some useful work in the world." 
 
 " I mean to be a stable-keeper when I grow
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 75 
 
 up," said Guy, " and then I can drive horses 
 all the time." 
 
 " Be sure you give your aunt a very high 
 horse to ride," said their father, who had come 
 into the room unobserved by his sister. 
 
 Theodora smiled. Edward had never seen 
 her look so gentle, tender, and feminine. He 
 recognized new possibilities in her as she bent 
 her proud head to look into the tiny face that 
 lay against her arm. 
 
 " See his little foot, Edward," and she pulled 
 back the blue-and-white blanket. " Did you 
 ever see anything so small and yet so perfect ? " 
 
 " Yes, I have seen three other pairs equally 
 small and perfect." 
 
 The little pink foot lay quiet in her strong 
 hand. " Think how soon this tiny, tiny foot 
 will have outstripped mine," she mused, " and 
 Nathaniel Bradlee Davidson will have grown 
 into a man, taking his part in the world, 
 and mercilessly ordering his Aunt Theodora 
 about ! " 
 
 She already had a sense of possession in 
 this small nephew which she did not feel with 
 the other children, for was he not to be her 
 especial charge from the very first? And
 
 76 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 was he not to bear the honorable family 
 name ? Edward had consented to his being 
 called Nathaniel Bradlee, to Theodora's great 
 delight. 
 
 Poor Marie, meanwhile, was so frail and ill 
 that she could no longer control her jealousy. 
 During the weeks which she spent upstairs 
 Theodora naturally became more and more 
 prominently the head of the household. As 
 Marie heard her giving orders to the ser- 
 vants, in her pleasant, even voice, she felt sure 
 that they would never consent to be ruled by 
 her again. She fancied she detected a pity- 
 ing glance from Sarah, the housemaid, that 
 seemed to say, " Poor thing, what a weak and 
 inadequate mistress she is when compared 
 with the energetic Miss Theodora ! " All 
 well-trained domestics liked Miss Davidson, 
 for she planned their work with system, and 
 was indulgent to the conscientious. The 
 inefficient nursery-maid, on the contrary, had 
 shown a marked dislike to her ; but Theodora 
 had sent her away, and had filled her place 
 with an exemplary Scotchwoman, who believed 
 in bringing up children by strict rule. Even 
 the children always appealed now either to
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 77 
 
 Elizabeth, their new nurse, or to their Aunt 
 Theodora. 
 
 One morning Gladys asked her mother if 
 she might eat some candy that she had 
 brought home with her from a children's 
 party the night before ; and when she was told 
 that she could have two pieces, Dora said 
 severely, " Gladys, you are a naughty girl ; 
 Aunt Theodora told you that you must n't eat 
 the candy. Aunt Theodora is our mamma 
 now that mamma is sick." 
 
 Marie turned her face to the wall and shed 
 bitter tears ; then she drew her baby close to 
 her and gave him a passionate embrace. 
 
 " She shall not come between us, you dear 
 little thing," she thought, " even if she does 
 supplant me in the affections of the older 
 children." 
 
 When Theodora entered the room a little 
 later, she was surprised to see that her sister- 
 in-law's cheeks were flushed. 
 
 " I must take the children away ; I am 
 afraid they are disturbing you," she said. 
 
 " Please leave them ; they are not disturbing 
 me," Marie entreated eagerly ; but Theodora, 
 with the best intentions in the world, was
 
 78 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 inexorable, and made them go downstairs with 
 her. 
 
 Marie had a little dictionary by her side, 
 and as soon as Theodora and the children had 
 left her she turned to " Common English 
 Christian Names of Men." She knew that 
 Theodora wanted to call the baby Nathaniel 
 Bradlee, and she had not had the courage as 
 yet to make more than a feeble protest against 
 this dreadful name ; but she meant to suggest 
 a beautiful one, such as Valentine or Cyril, to 
 her husband, who, until his sister had come, 
 had never gainsaid her wishes. 
 
 " My precious baby," she began, " you shall 
 have the finest name that any little boy can 
 have. How would you like Anthony, you 
 darling ? Or Arthur ? That is a little too 
 common now. What do you think of Brian ? 
 Or Cyril ? That is one of the prettiest. 
 Dennis is another of my favorites, but I don't 
 like the sound of Dennis Davidson. Lionel 
 is fine, but that means young lion, and, dar- 
 ling, I hope you won't be that kind of a man, 
 but will be gentle and courteous to every one, 
 like your father." 
 
 She commented in turn on each name that
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 79 
 
 pleased her fancy, and reduced the number at 
 last to Cyril, Lancelot, Norman, Reginald, and 
 Valentine. The baby was born on Valentine's 
 eve, which seemed a reason for giving him that 
 name ; but it was not as imperative a reason 
 as if his birthday had beqn on the fourteenth, 
 and Valentine might be too fanciful if he lived 
 to be an old man. 
 
 " Theodora," Marie inquired timidly, when 
 her sister-in-law brought in her tea that even- 
 ing, " don't you think that Cyril would be a 
 very good name for the baby ? Cyril Davidson 
 sounds so well." 
 
 It took a good deal of courage to ask this 
 question. 
 
 " Why, Marie ! " Theodora cried in conster- 
 nation, " I thought the baby's name was settled. 
 Edward told me that you had agreed that he 
 should be called Nathaniel Bradlee." 
 
 " But Nathaniel is such a of course it is 
 a very good name," she added hastily, not 
 wanting to hurt Theodora's feelings, " only 
 don't you think he might object to it after he 
 grew up ? So many people think it an ugly 
 name." 
 
 " If he is anything like our side of the house,
 
 80 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 he will be proud of a name that has been in 
 the family for three generations." 
 
 " But suppose he should be like my fam- 
 ily ? " Marie asked with hesitation. " So 
 many of us have had pretty names and cared 
 about them. If he were to be called some- 
 thing besides Nathaniel, which do you like 
 best, Cyril, or Norman, or Reginald ? Or 
 do you prefer Lancelot or Valentine ? " 
 
 " I dislike them all, and so would he when 
 he grew up. No man likes to go through life 
 saddled with a fanciful name." 
 
 " But do you think, Theodora, that a man 
 likes to go through life saddled with an 
 with a name that most people think is ugly?" 
 
 " A plain name is n't any more of a draw- 
 back to a man than a plain face, and it is a 
 great advantage to him from a business point 
 of view to have a name that is known through- 
 out New England. Don't you agree with me ? " 
 
 " I suppose it is an advantage," Marie ac- 
 knowledged weakly. She had neither the 
 physical strength nor the moral courage to 
 pursue the subject at present. 
 
 " I am sure you will grow fond of ' Nathan- 
 iel,' " Theodora said cheerfully as she left the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 81 
 
 room. " There is nothing like having plea- 
 sant associations with a name to make one care 
 for it." 
 
 Marie wondered if the same rule would 
 work in Theodora's case, and if pleasant asso- 
 ciations would endear Lancelot or Valentine 
 to her, but she kept her thoughts to herself. 
 As for Theodora, she was too thankful to have 
 rescued one of her nephews from the infliction 
 of a romantic name to have any sympathy for 
 his mother's point of view. 
 
 After her sister-in-law had departed, Marie 
 drew her baby to her and gave a despairing 
 sigh. 
 
 " My precious love," she said, " I can't 
 bear to have you called by that odious name 
 Nathaniel, all because your aunt wishes it ; I 
 am of no account any more ; but you are mine, 
 mine, mine ! Nathaniel Bradlee Davidson, you 
 are only her nephew, and yet you are to have 
 her mark upon you. Nathaniel Bradlee, you 
 poor little fellow, your mamma will call you 
 Niel ! that will make a very pretty nickname. 
 I am of no use to anybody, baby, and if I 
 were to die I have no doubt that your Aunt 
 Theodora would bring you up beautifully, a
 
 82 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 great deal better than I shall, you darling! 
 How I hate her ! And yet how I love her, 
 too ! for she is so good." 
 
 When the day for the christening came, 
 Marie was well enough to be lying on the sofa 
 in the studio in a pale-blue wrapper. She 
 looked as fair and sweet as a Fra Angelico 
 angel. The two ministers had been summoned 
 for the occasion : the Reverend Mr. Thorndyke 
 was to take the preliminary part of the service 
 and give the little fellow his name, as he was 
 an old friend of the last Nathaniel Davidson ; 
 and Mr. Compton was to make the concluding 
 prayer. 
 
 Marie wanted the christening to take place 
 in the studio, for sentimental reasons ; but 
 Edward had a sense of whimsical incongruity, 
 as he noticed that the silver hair of the bene- 
 volent old clergyman had a plaster cast of the 
 Apollo Belvedere for a background. The 
 head of Clytie kept watch in another corner, 
 and the Venus de Milo looked at them benig- 
 nantly from the top of a chest of drawers. 
 There were copies from some of the old mas- 
 ters on the walls ; Correggio's Diana was next 
 to a Cupid and Psyche, while some of Marie's
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 83 
 
 studies filled in the interstices. Paganism 
 and Christianity seemed to meet as the old 
 minister began his long prayer, unabashed by 
 the motley company that Edward felt were 
 gazing curiously at him from the walls. 
 
 The three older children sat with big, round 
 eyes fixed on their little brother, who looked 
 very trim and nice in the long white dress that 
 his aunt had daintily tucked and ruffled. His 
 father held him in a tentative fashion, and 
 presently the little fellow puckered up his red 
 face and began to wail lustily. 
 
 " Edward, he is n't comfortable ; let me 
 take him," Theodora whispered. Edward re- 
 linquished him, only too gladly, in spite of 
 Marie's disapproval. The little creature 
 stopped crying at once, and nestled his head 
 against his aunt's strong arm. She looked 
 very beautiful as she stood with the winter sun- 
 light shining on her fine face, that was softened 
 almost beyond recognition as she glanced down 
 at the tiny person in her arms. The baby 
 was very quiet during the minister's long 
 prayer, but he gave one faint cry as the kind 
 old man took him from his aunt. Then Mr. 
 Thorndyke dipped his fingers in a silver bowl
 
 84 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 that stood on the table and touched the child's 
 forehead. 
 
 Theodora felt a thrill as she thought of the 
 other Nathaniel Bradlee Davidsons who had 
 once been as helpless as this baby, and had 
 afterwards taken a useful part in the great 
 world. There was a hush for a moment broken 
 at last by Mr. Thorndyke's solemn voice : 
 
 " Cyril, I baptize thee in the name of the Fa- 
 ther, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." 
 
 Theodora seemed dazed, and glanced at her 
 brother in a questioning way. He nodded as 
 if to say, " It is all right." Her color rose, and 
 an angry light shone in her eyes. The angel- 
 like Marie's face wore an all too earthly ex- 
 pression of triumph. Mr. Compton, who had 
 heard the name discussed, looked sympathetic- 
 ally from the mother to the aunt. Theodora 
 did not hear one word of his concluding prayer. 
 
 After the outsiders had departed, she con- 
 fronted her brother with an unnatural calm in 
 her voice, and an equally unnatural brilliancy 
 about the eyes. 
 
 " Why did you let that child have such an 
 outlandish name as Cyril, after what you 
 promised me ? " she asked.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 85 
 
 " Now, Theo, calm yourself." 
 
 "I am calm enough," she said coldly. 
 " Why did you allow it? " she persisted. 
 
 " Because I found at the last minute, after 
 the ministers had come, and while you were 
 getting the little beggar, that his mother was 
 worried almost to death at the idea of his be- 
 ing called Nathaniel. Now, Theodora, do you 
 honestly think it is a pretty name? " 
 
 " It was a good enough name for three gen- 
 erations of Davidsons." 
 
 " That is true, my love, but it was not suffi- 
 ciently euphonious for the fourth generation. 
 My father did not like it well enough to give 
 it to me." 
 
 " If she had called him Edward, for you, I 
 should not have minded ; but fancy carrying 
 the name of Cyril through life ! " 
 
 " It is better than Valentine." 
 
 " Valentine would have been preposterous ; 
 but, Edward, you promised me " 
 
 " Look here, Theodora, what is a poor man 
 to do, when his only sister says she shall die if 
 his child is called Cyril, and his only wife 
 says she shall die if he is called Nathaniel? 
 We might have called him Cyril Nathaniel, or
 
 86 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Nathaniel Cyril, to be sure, but the names 
 don't seem to ' gee,' if you will excuse the col- 
 loquialism." 
 
 " Well, there is nothing to be done about 
 it now," she said in tragic tones. 
 
 Theodora went upstairs to her own room, 
 and, after locking the door, flung herself down 
 in the old-fashioned chintz armchair, and 
 wrung and twisted her handkerchief through 
 her fingers ; she was all ablaze with anger. 
 She was too unused to self - analysis to be 
 aware that her indignation arose quite as 
 much from the fact that she had been de- 
 feated by Marie as from the question of names. 
 " The underhanded little thing ! " she said to 
 herself. " If she had told me that she was 
 going to call him Cyril, I should not have com- 
 plained. And this is the woman to whom my 
 brother has given his passionate affection ! " 
 It did not once occur to her that her sister-in- 
 law's lack of openness was the direct result 
 of her own domineering will. Theodora had 
 never been so angry since the night when she 
 had defied her father so many years ago. 
 Why was it, she asked herself, that insincere 
 women without strength of character were the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 87 
 
 women who were idealized by men? She 
 would willingly die for her brother. Had she 
 not sacrificed all her cherished plans because 
 she believed he needed her? and toiled for 
 him patiently for nine long months ? And 
 this was her reward ! At the first faint sug- 
 gestion from his wife, he had broken his pro- 
 mise to her. The strongest and the most 
 unselfish love of a brother for a sister counted 
 for nothing when put in the scale against the 
 love of husband and wife. Theodora was a 
 woman who craved with her whole passionate 
 heart to be first with those whom she loved. 
 What was the meaning of life? she asked 
 herself. Was it to be one long struggle to do 
 and to bear, with no reward in this world but 
 to see her best beloved drift away to worship 
 at some alien shrine? Was there nothing 
 that a woman could call her own unless she 
 had a husband and children ? As her anger 
 in the present petty quarrel died away in her 
 interest in these greater questions, she looked 
 down absently at the handkerchief in her lap, 
 and saw that she had torn it badly in her 
 excitement. This insignificant circumstance 
 brought her to herself with a shock. It terri-
 
 88 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 fied her to think that she had so far lost her 
 self-control as to be unconscious of what she 
 was doing. She thrust the handkerchief into 
 the grate, and pressed it down with the tongs 
 into the heart of a bed of coals. She watched 
 it smoulder and burn, and then gave a little 
 sigh of relief. The conflagration seemed to 
 clear the atmosphere, and now that she was 
 calmer she was able to do justice to her sister- 
 in-law, and went downstairs, with a revulsion 
 of feeling, to find her. Marie was still lying 
 on the sofa in the studio, and Edward was ten- 
 derly holding her hand. They started guiltily 
 at her approach. 
 
 " Marie," said Theodora penitently, " I am 
 sorry that you did not tell me how much you 
 wanted to name the baby Cyril. Of course 
 you were the person to name him, and it was 
 selfish of me to urge you to call him something 
 else, but I did not know how much you cared." 
 
 Marie colored rosy red and opened her 
 arms wide to Theodora. " Dear, dear Theo- 
 dora," she said, " I meant to call him Xa- 
 thaniel, to please you ; but at the last moment 
 it seemed as if I could not bear it : will you 
 forgive me ? "
 
 VII. 
 
 DUEING the weeks that Marie was upstairs, 
 Theodora had rejoiced in having her brother 
 to herself, for she thought it an excellent 
 opportunity to counteract his wife's influence. 
 Her sister-in-law's chief object was to make 
 Edward comfortable and happy, whereas her 
 own cherished desire, as she had confided to 
 Frank Compton, was to develop his latent 
 powers. It was inexcusable for a man with 
 such unusual talents to fritter away his life. 
 He did not seem inclined to begin one of 
 the important pictures for which he so often 
 found a subject, and, as she knew nothing 
 about art, she decided to turn her attention to 
 his literary career. He had been class poet 
 in college, and in his younger days had fre- 
 quently dreamed of distinguishing himself in 
 literature. Theodora was sure that he was 
 exactly the person to write the biography 
 of their Revolutionary ancestor, and conse- 
 quently, evening after evening, she made him
 
 90 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 read over old family letters with her, and put 
 aside those which might be useful in the Life 
 of General Nathaniel Bradlee Davidson. At 
 first he had been amused by the letters, as 
 he was by all new things, and had rashly 
 expressed his interest, in his somewhat exag- 
 gerated fashion. 
 
 " Theo," he said, as they sat together cosily 
 one evening in the studio, " how nice it is that 
 you are here, and what a jolly thing it is to 
 have ancestors ! By the way, how thoughtful 
 it is in Providence to provide all of us with 
 them ! A poor fellow may miss the joy of 
 descendants, but ancestors, like the poor, are 
 with him always." 
 
 In the course of time, however, Edward 
 deeply regretted the ubiquitous quality of his 
 ancestors, for he found the perusal of their 
 letters an intolerable bore. 
 
 Theodora also interested herself in making 
 out the Davidson genealogy, but her brother 
 gave her slight assistance in this pursuit. 
 There are limits which the most amiable of 
 men cannot pass. 
 
 " I wish to Heaven that I had been a work- 
 house foundling," he once said to Marie, " or
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 91 
 
 that all of my ancestors had been hanged ! 
 They were such a terribly upright race, too ! 
 If I could only learn of a Davidson who had 
 forged, or committed a murder, I should have 
 a feeling of thorough satisfaction, but they 
 were so monotonously exemplary and ener- 
 getic ! They make me feel as if I wanted to 
 burn down somebody's house, or run off with 
 somebody's money, just to vary the family 
 record." 
 
 "Why don't you tell Theodora how you 
 feel ? " his wife asked with a smile. 
 
 " Good heavens, Marie ! I should as soon 
 think of telling you that Cyril bores me, or 
 that I should be pleased if Guy and Gladys 
 could be quietly drowned in the river. Her 
 ancestors are to Theo what our descendants 
 are to us." 
 
 " I am sure it is a fine thing to have come 
 of such a noble race," said Marie. 
 
 " It would be all very well except that they 
 set a standard. I don't mind people's being 
 good, if they only won't expect me to follow 
 in their footsteps. What do you suppose 
 Theodora is trying for now? She wants to 
 turn me into a model citizen. She says that I
 
 92 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 am one of the richest men in town, as if that 
 were my fault and not my misfortune. I 
 can't help it if my ancestors worked like bees 
 and hoarded up a little pile of money, and I 
 don't see why I must assume responsibilities 
 that are not of my own making. She thinks 
 that, because I am one of the richest and 
 idlest men in Edgecomb, I ought to go to 
 town-meeting, and take an active part in all 
 the town projects. She wants me to be one 
 of the selectmen. I tell her that I am a suf- 
 ficiently select man as it is." 
 
 So long as Theodora had confined her at- 
 tention to improving his property, Edward 
 had remained quiescent ; now that she had 
 begun to attempt to improve himself, he grew 
 restive. Why in thunder did a man settle 
 in the country? Had he been of an active, 
 stirring temperament he would have lived in 
 the city. He did not want to " improve each 
 shining hour ; " far from it ! His mission in 
 life was, not to do a great work, but to amuse 
 himself and charm his friends. Would he be 
 as much beloved if he dashed into the arena 
 of the town-meeting, and took sides in all the 
 petty questions that divided his fellow towns- 
 men?
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 93 
 
 Of course he did not say all this to Theo- 
 dora, for Theo would not have liked it. He 
 could not bear to destroy that ideal of him 
 which she had enshrined in her heart ever 
 since they were boy and girl together. He did 
 not want to have her learn suddenly what it 
 had taken him a dozen years to discover, 
 namely, the probability that he never would 
 become either the artistic or literary genius 
 that in those far-away days he had beguiled 
 her into thinking he was to be. 
 
 When Marie was well enough to come down- 
 stairs, she too was treated to the letters of 
 General Nathaniel Bradlee Davidson. She 
 thought them insufferably tedious ; but it 
 pained her less to seem to listen to them, while 
 she was in reality thinking about her next 
 picture or planning her children's clothes, 
 than it would have done to hurt her sister-in- 
 law's feelings. How Marie sighed for the dear, 
 delightful, vagrant evenings of a year ago, 
 when she and Edward sat in the all too dusty 
 studio, while he smoked and she sewed, and 
 they chatted about trifles, or else he read aloud 
 some amusing novel ! Theodora by no means 
 despised novels, and had read a number of
 
 94 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 them aloud in the past nine months, but she 
 was a woman who was always intensely inter- 
 ested in the subject at hand. 
 
 Unhappily for Edward, the sorting of the 
 family letters could not go on forever. By 
 April the flowers had been culled from the 
 weeds, so to speak, and had been put in his 
 desk, tied in neat bundles and ready for im- 
 mediate use. 
 
 " There is no reason for delaying your work 
 any longer, Edward," Theodora said with de- 
 cision one bright morning. " I will escort 
 you to the den now, and leave you to begin 
 your task, for everything is ready." 
 
 " Theo, I am going up the river to make a 
 sketch this morning." 
 
 " So you said yesterday, but you came back 
 without a sketch. You might as well begin 
 to-day as to put it off any longer." 
 
 "My darling, my beloved and cherished 
 Theodora, you do not understand these things. 
 I have no stirrings of the muse to-day. I must 
 wait until I am in the right mood to begin." 
 
 " You have said that all winter, dear. If 
 you wait for the right mood, you will never 
 accomplish anything."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 95 
 
 " Was n't it George Eliot who said that 
 'genius must never cramp its glorious wings 
 by writing, unless the spirit of the muse 
 moves ' ? " he inquired insinuatingly, impro- 
 vising the quotation with guilty facility. 
 
 " I don't think so. You must have got it 
 mixed up with what somebody else said, for 
 it does not sound like her. She said that 
 'genius implies hard work.' ' 
 
 " Then, Theo, it is barely possible that you 
 have overrated my ability, and that I have 
 merely talent. Indeed, my dear, I begin to 
 doubt my capacity for the job." 
 
 " And I begin to doubt your desire for it. 
 If you have no intention of writing this life of 
 our great-grandfather, please say so at once ; 
 no one compels you to do it. It is what you 
 always have said you meant to do, ever since 
 we were children." 
 
 Should he own that he did not have suffi- 
 cient patience for the task? Or should he 
 honestly try to accomplish this piece of work, 
 which covered an interesting period of history, 
 and was well worth the doing? He tempo- 
 rized. 
 
 " It would be awfully interesting if it were
 
 96 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 well done," he acknowledged ; " but, after all, 
 the ground has been covered so many times 
 that I don't believe I could ever get it pub- 
 lished. You have no idea, Theodora, how 
 hard it is to find a publisher, even for the 
 best books." 
 
 " I suppose it is ; but you can at least ar- 
 range the letters in such a form that your sons 
 can read them by and by. As they are now, 
 no one will ever take the trouble to decipher 
 them, but your handwriting is as legible as 
 copperplate." 
 
 " I have at least improved upon the old 
 general in that particular." 
 
 " Indeed you have. You can copy the let- 
 ters, and put in a few connecting links, and 
 have a pamphlet printed for private circula- 
 tion, if you do nothing more. You would 
 be much happier if you had a regular occu- 
 pation." 
 
 " Yes ? If so, I am almost afraid to risk it. 
 I am awfully happy as it is, Theodora. If I 
 become any happier, I don't think I can stay 
 on this earth." 
 
 Theodora could not help laughing, but she 
 did not give up her point.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 97 
 
 " Edward Davidson, will you, or will you 
 not, copy some letters this morning? As I 
 said before, no one compels you to do it. It 
 is only a little thing that I ask as a favor." 
 
 Edward yielded because it was easier to 
 yield than to contest the point. He had 
 evaded his fate for two months ; he felt that 
 he coidd escape it 110 longer. He went up to 
 his den and had a good smoke. As he was 
 a sociable man, he did not like being shut 
 away from the others while he smoked, and 
 neither did he enjoy working alone, but, nev- 
 ertheless, in the two hours of his solitary 
 confinement he actually copied three letters. 
 Theodora was radiant when she saw what he 
 had done. 
 
 It was all very well for once, but there was 
 a to-morrow coming, in fact a long succession 
 of bright spring to-morrows, when he wanted 
 to be out in his boat, or dreamily drinking 
 in the fragrant air on some hillside while 
 he dashed off a hurried sketch, or hunted for 
 wild-flowers with the children. 
 
 " You know nobody likes an out-of-door life 
 more than I do," Theodora returned, one 
 morning, when he gave the glorious weather as
 
 98 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 an excuse for not working. " I can sympa- 
 thize with your feeling entirely, but you will 
 have all the rest of the day for out-of-doors, 
 and I am sure you will enjoy yourself a great 
 deal better if you do a little work first. If 
 you once give up working for a day, it will be 
 hard to resume the habit. Do copy at least 
 one letter to please me," she entreated. 
 
 It was easier to copy one letter than to have 
 a discussion, but Edward went up to his den 
 in an angry frame of mind. Theo was a fine 
 girl and he loved her dearly, but if she was to 
 live with him for the rest of his life and insist 
 upon his distinguishing himself either in lit- 
 erature or art, or town politics, he should go 
 out and hang himself at the first convenient 
 opportunity. When he unburdened himself 
 to Marie she reproved him gently, although 
 she could not help a secret sense of triumph 
 at the turn that affairs had taken. 
 
 " She is a splendid woman, and I wish I 
 were half as superior," she said. 
 
 " Marie, dear, I should have deserted you 
 long ago if you had been. Happily, one can 
 get a divorce from an uncongenial wife. One 
 can leave home, as Theodora did, if one has
 
 THE COMIXG OF THEODORA. 99 
 
 uncongenial parents. But, ye gods ! how is 
 one to escape from a sister whose only fault is 
 her superiority? You can't get a divorce from 
 a sister, and neither can you turn her out of 
 your house when you have asked her to live 
 with you forever. Who would have thought 
 that a fine-looking, conscientious, attractive, 
 efficient girl could have contrived to make 
 herself so insufferable in one short year ? " 
 
 " Dear," said Marie soothingly, " think how 
 much she has done for us. You will love her 
 as well as ever to-morrow. You are vexed 
 because she made you go to town-meeting last 
 night, and insisted upon your copying those 
 letters to-day ; but really, Ned, it will be a 
 fine thing if you do write a book about your 
 great-grandfather. We shall have a little 
 change to-morrow," she added, for they were 
 going to spend a few days with Frank Comp- 
 ton's sister. 
 
 " Yes, Heaven be praised ! Charlotte Pres- 
 ton is almost as much of a trump as old 
 Fanny. To be sure, her husband is a trifle 
 particular, being a minister ; but he is a sym- 
 pathetic soul, and when he knows my suffer- 
 ings, I think he will let me smoke in the
 
 100 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 drawing-room, and swear a little, in a quiet 
 and genteel way, of course ; and perhaps, if 
 he knows the whole state of the case, he will 
 consent to let me relieve myself by setting fire 
 to his stable."
 
 VIII. 
 
 THAT evening Frank Compton came to give 
 the Davidsons messages for his sister. 
 
 " Mrs. Davidson," he said, as he settled 
 himself comfortably in the studio, where she 
 and Theodora were sitting, " I have made up 
 my mind that I can't leave the study as it is 
 any longer. Marianne, my housemaid, says 
 it is disgraceful, and I ani afraid she is right. 
 The Association is to dine with me next 
 month, and I must have it in order before 
 that time. If you will ask Charlotte to get 
 a carpet, and some curtains and things, I shall 
 be greatly obliged to you." 
 
 " You are going to change that room ? " 
 Marie asked in a low tone. 
 
 " Yes, I can't help it ; the carpet is actually 
 in rags, and the curtains and two of the chair- 
 coverings are past redemption." 
 
 " Then I suppose she would be the first 
 to wish it," Marie said, with a little sigh. 
 ' What are the dimensions of the room ? " 
 she inquired presently.
 
 102 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " I have n't the faintest idea. I thought 
 perhaps you and Ned would be so good as to 
 look it over to-morrow morning, and see what 
 colors would go best there, and how much I 
 need of everything. I know it is asking a 
 great deal, but you have been so awfully good 
 to me, and your own house is so pretty, and 
 I don't know in the least what I ought to 
 have." 
 
 Theodora could not help joining in the dis- 
 cussion that followed, for house-decoration 
 was as stimulating to her as the battle is to 
 the war-horse. She threw herself into the 
 question of reconstruction with such ardor 
 that it was finally settled that she and Marie 
 should go to the parsonage the next morning 
 to overlook the study and take the requisite 
 measurements. 
 
 " By the way," said Edward, who sauntered 
 in at this point, "how are the new servants 
 working ? " 
 
 Frank's domestic affairs had had the variety 
 and picturesqueness of a dime novel of late, to 
 quote one of Edward's phrases. 
 
 " I am not sure of Nora, but Marianne is a 
 trump. You can tell Charlotte that I have n't
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 103 
 
 been so well off since she was married. I can 
 have my ' evening out ' now as often as I like, 
 for if she says she will stay with Essie she 
 keeps her word." 
 
 " If I am not mistaken, I met her in the vil- 
 lage half an hour ago with Patrick O'Brien." 
 
 " It is impossible ! She promised that she 
 would not leave the house, and besides she is 
 too self-respecting a girl to have anything to 
 do with that O'Brien fellow. It must have 
 been her sister Lizzie." 
 
 " Has she a twin sister, who wears a gray 
 dress just like hers, and a hat with red roses 
 in it ? " 
 
 " I don't know their clothes, but you could 
 n't have seen Marianne, for I am as sure of 
 her as I should be of you." 
 
 " If she is like me, she must be a perfect 
 treasure, must n't she, Theodora ? What ! 
 are you going so soon, Frank ? " 
 
 " Yes ; if there is any chance that Essie is 
 left alone, I must go back, although I am sure 
 Marianne would not break her promise." 
 
 When Mr. Compton reached the parsonage 
 he rang the bell, instead of letting himself 
 in with his latch-key. To his infinite relief,
 
 104 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Marianne appeared promptly. She was as 
 demure and respectful as usual, and as he 
 glanced at her slight, lady-like figure and 
 gentle face he was ashamed of his doubts, and 
 yet he felt it incumbent upon him to inquire 
 if she had been at home all the evening. 
 
 " And why should I go out, sir ? " she asked 
 reproachfully. " Did n't I promise you that I 
 would stay in ? " and she raised her innocent 
 blue eyes to his with a grieved expression. 
 
 " I was sure it was a mistake, but somebody 
 thought he saw you in the village with that 
 O'Brien fellow. I don't like his looks, Ma- 
 rianne." 
 
 " I don't myself," she assented ; then she 
 added, " It must have been my sister Lizzie 
 who was with him, sir." 
 
 " If I had a sister who knew him, I should 
 warn her against him, for he drinks." 
 
 Marianne did not reply, but turned to go 
 back to the kitchen. 
 
 " Oh, see here, Marianne," he called after 
 her, " there seemed to be very few towels and 
 pillow-cases in the linen-closet when I went for 
 some towels this morning. Do you know 
 where they are ? "
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 105 
 
 " Yes, sir, there were a great maiiy in the 
 wash this week." 
 
 " Ought n't they to be out of the wash by 
 Friday ? " he asked with hesitation. He dis- 
 liked exceedingly to reprove this delicate, 
 refined-looking creature. 
 
 " Yes, sir ; they ought to be ironed by Tues- 
 day night, but it rained the first of the week." 
 
 "Marianne, some ladies are coming in the 
 morning to take the measure for the new cur- 
 tains and carpet in the study. You must see 
 that the room is in order, and if I am not at 
 home you must have the yardstick and tape- 
 measure ready." 
 
 A shade came across Marianne's face. " Of 
 course it is as you please, sir, but I could have 
 taken the measurements, and gone to Boston 
 and bought anything you required." 
 
 " You are very kind, but my sister will get 
 the things for me." 
 
 Early the next morning Dobbin, the worthy 
 but lazy white horse, was harnessed into the 
 rejuvenated buggy, and Theodora drove Marie 
 down to the parsonage. It was a pleasant, 
 square, old-fashioned white house, standing a 
 little back from the street, with two great
 
 106 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 horse-chestnut trees, one on either side of the 
 bricked walk which led from the gate to the 
 door. Marianne met them with the news that 
 Mr. Gompton had been called away to see a 
 sick parishioner, and she showed them into the 
 study at the right of the hall with her habitual 
 air of imperturbable respect. 
 
 " It seems a shame to have to alter this 
 dear old room," said Marie, as they crossed 
 its threshold. " It is full of the things that 
 belonged to Mrs. Compton ; Frank would not 
 have anything changed." 
 
 Theodora glanced about her with inter- 
 est. " How charming that is ! " she said, as 
 she paused to examine the white mantelpiece, 
 carved with festoons of leaves, which was op- 
 posite her as she entered the study. 
 
 In front of the fireplace stood Mr. Comp- 
 ton's study-table, a commodious affair, with 
 numerous drawers and an ink-splashed green 
 cover. In one corner of the room was an up- 
 right piano, and over it hung a banjo tied with 
 a ribbon that had once been pink. In an- 
 other corner was a Davenport desk, and above 
 it was a portrait of Mrs. Compton. Theodora 
 gave an exclamation of surprise as her eyes
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 107 
 
 reached this point in her survey. " What an 
 interesting face ! " 
 
 " Is n't it ? Edward painted her long ago, 
 before she was married." 
 
 " It is the best piece of work he ever did ; 
 very sketchy, of course, but the eyes seem 
 alive as they look at us. What beautiful dark 
 eyes ! like Essie's, only with a soul in them. 
 Why has nobody told me anything about 
 her?" 
 
 Theodora stood spell-bound before the pic- 
 ture of the dark-haired girl, with her Spanish 
 coloring, and pathetic, earnest, passionate eyes. 
 It was a life-size sketch of her head and 
 shoulders against a dusky background, framed 
 in tarnished gold. She wore a white dress of 
 some shimmering material, which caught the 
 light, and the only bright bit of color in the 
 picture was a deep-red rose at her throat. 
 
 " Was she unhappy when she was a girl? " 
 Theodora asked. " She has a half sad, half 
 dissatisfied expression that I can't quite make 
 out." 
 
 " I don't think she was unhappy. I fancy 
 she was passionate and intense, like Essie, only 
 with fascination. She was full of talent. She
 
 108 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 and Edward used to act together in private 
 theatricals, and he says that she was a capital 
 actress and wanted to go on the stage. I im- 
 agine she was something of a flirt, for she had 
 all the boys in town in her train ; but as soon 
 as Frank Compton came upon the scene nobody 
 else had a chance, for they fell in love with 
 each other at first sight. They were ideally 
 happy. Edward is n't sure it would have 
 lasted, for she was an erratic creature, and 
 thirsted for excitement ; but I think it would, 
 for Frank is so fine, and she was very devoted 
 to him during the year of their marriage. 
 Edward says he never saw such a change in 
 any one." 
 
 Theodora looked from the intense young 
 face, that seemed glowing with life even when 
 seen merely through the medium of paint and 
 canvas, to its dingy surroundings, and she 
 had a longing to escape into the air and sun- 
 shine, out of this room full of bitter and sweet 
 suggestions, where she had no business to be, 
 she, the clear-headed, practical woman of af- 
 fairs. She had a quick shrinking from the 
 knowledge that there was pain in the world 
 which was greater than she could imagine.
 
 THE COHflNG OF THEODORA. 109 
 
 "Can't we keep a part of the carpet and 
 have the floor painted around the edge?" 
 Marie was asking, and Theodora came back 
 to the present with an effort. 
 
 "Those curtains are hopeless," Marie de- 
 cided, after the carpet had been thoroughly 
 discussed. " If you will measure them, I will 
 measure the floor." 
 
 Theodora mounted a mahogany chair with 
 a worn flowered chintz cover, and began to 
 take the measurements. 
 
 At this moment the door opened with a 
 bang, and Essie, flushed and stormy-eyed, 
 rushed into the room. 
 
 " What are you doing here in my papa's 
 study ? " she asked, in the voice in which the 
 biggest of the three bears addressed Silver- 
 hair. 
 
 Marie gave a little start. Theodora, who 
 had never overcome her antagonism to this 
 child, glanced down at her half contemptu- 
 ously. 
 
 " We are here because your father asked us 
 to come," she replied succinctly. 
 
 " What are you doing? " 
 
 " Essie, darling," said Marie gently, " your
 
 110 THE COMING OF THEODOSA. 
 
 papa thinks that he must have a new carpet 
 and paper and curtains, so that the ministers 
 may be comfortable when they come here next 
 month." 
 
 " I don't want anything changed," Essie 
 cried passionately. " My dear mamma bought 
 the curtains and carpet." 
 
 " They were very pretty then, dearest, but 
 they are ragged now, and your mamma would 
 not like your papa to have ragged things in 
 his study, for she was very particular. Every- 
 thing else will be here just the same, her pic- 
 ture and the piano, and her desk and all her 
 little things. Dearest Essie, be reasonable. 
 You are only seven years old " 
 
 " Seven and a half," Essie corrected. 
 
 " And your papa is a grown-up man. He 
 knows what is best, and you love him so much 
 that I am sure you want to please him." 
 
 Essie was silent a moment, and glanced 
 angrily at Theodora. 
 
 " Why is she here ? " she demanded in a 
 fierce whisper. "Can't you get along with- 
 out her?" 
 
 Theodora overheard the question, and 
 turned to look down at the tempestuous child.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. Ill 
 
 " Essie," she said dryly, " your papa asked 
 me to come here this morning, but if you wish 
 to send me home I will go, and you can tell 
 him that you prefer to choose the guests who 
 are to come to his house." 
 
 Essie was brought to her usual self-con- 
 scious, awkward, painfully shy self by these 
 words. She relapsed into silence and presently 
 quitted the room, retiring to a corner of the 
 staircase, where she sobbed as if her heart 
 would break. 
 
 " I must comfort the poor little soul," said 
 Marie ; and when Mr. Compton came home, 
 a few minutes later, he found the two sitting 
 together on the stairs. Essie's dark head 
 was lying in Mrs. Davidson's lap, while she 
 tenderly stroked the child's forehead. 
 
 Theodora could hear Marie's gentle expos- 
 tulations with Essie, and Frank's explanations 
 to his daughter. She longed to have them 
 give the child the shaking she so richly de- 
 served, instead of condescending to argue with 
 her. 
 
 " Essie," said her father at last, " you will 
 tumble your Aunt Marie's nice dress with that 
 tousled black hair of yours. By the way, I
 
 112 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 am thinking of having her hair cut, she is so 
 uncomfortable ; on a day like this she really 
 suffers." 
 
 " I would," said Marie. " Children are so 
 much more comfortable with short hair, and it 
 would be more becoming to her." 
 
 This reminded Theodora that it would be 
 a good plan to have her nieces' hair cut, but 
 in the hurry of the preparations for Marie's 
 journey she forgot to broach the subject. 
 
 Her brother and his wife were much re- 
 freshed mentally by their outing, in spite of 
 the severe heat which followed them, but 
 Marie was greatly fatigued physically. It 
 frightened her to find how little strength she 
 had, and that the least adverse circumstance 
 brought her to the verge of tears. Edward, 
 however, was so devoted and considerate that 
 even the jolting car-ride was not wholly unen- 
 durable. 
 
 " Dearest," Marie said, as the train ap- 
 proached Edgecomb, "what bliss it has been 
 to have these three days with you ! " 
 
 " We could not have gone without Theo- 
 dora," he reminded her. 
 
 They smiled at the mention of her name,
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 113 
 
 and felt a little guilty, for they had not been 
 able to refrain from a few remarks, made to 
 each other in the strictest confidence, concern-- 
 ing- the pleasure of having a vacation from her. 
 They were too loyal, however, to give even a 
 hint to outsiders of the state of the case. 
 
 Edward had business in the village, so 
 Marie went home without him. As Michael 
 drove up to the front gate, she noticed Guy's 
 bright face at the window, and then there was 
 a quick pattering of little feet. 
 
 " Don't say a word, Gladys," said Dora, 
 gleefully ; " we '11 see if she notices." 
 
 As the front door opened, Gladys, in spite 
 of Dora's caution, rushed forward and cried : 
 " Look at me, mamma ! And look at Dora ! 
 Don't we look comfortable ? We feel so 
 cool ! " 
 
 Two red spots were burning in Mrs. David- 
 son's cheeks. 
 
 " My little girls," she said, " my naughty, 
 naughty little girls! who told you that you 
 could have your hair cut ? " 
 
 " Aunt Theodora told us that we could 
 have our hair cut," replied Dora, emerging 
 from the parlor with her little cropped head.
 
 114 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " I should like to kill your Aunt Theodora," 
 said their mother under her breath. 
 
 The children could not hear the exclama- 
 tion, but they saw that something was wrong. 
 
 " Don't you like it, mamma ? " Gladys in- 
 quired anxiously. " Aunt Theodora said you 
 thought children were more comfortable with 
 short hair in hot weather. We were sure 
 you would be pleased. Aunt Theodora said 
 we could have it done, and Essie was hav- 
 ing her hair cut, and it was such a good 
 chance ; and you were away, so we could not 
 ask you." 
 
 " It is all very well for Essie to have that 
 long, straight mane of hers cut, but your curly 
 hair was so picturesque and so pretty ! Oh, 
 my darlings ! I shall never have my curly- 
 headed little girls any more ! " and she sank 
 tearfully into a chair in the studio. 
 
 Gladys's golden cropped head was instantly 
 in her mother's lap, but the cropped brown 
 head of Dora was defiant. 
 
 " Aunt Theodora said " she began. 
 
 " You should not have minded what your 
 Aunt Theodora said. You should not have 
 had your hair cut without asking me. You
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 115 
 
 were very naughty children. Aunt Theodora 
 is not your mother." 
 
 " Dear mamma," said Gladys, " dear, dear, 
 darling mamma, I am so sorry ! " 
 
 " Oh ! you don't seem like my little girls ! 
 This is too much ! I can never forgive her. 
 Oh dear, oh dear ! How pretty your hair 
 was ! And it may never curl again. It may 
 make a difference all your lives. I can never, 
 never forgive her." 
 
 The little girls looked at their mother in a 
 wondering way. They felt vaguely that they 
 had been very naughty, but that Aunt Theo- 
 dora had been very naughty, too. There was 
 some comfort in this reflection. 
 
 When Edward hurried in a little late to 
 tea, he could not but notice that something 
 was amiss, as he glanced at his wife's flushed 
 face. What is the matter now? he thought 
 in dismay, as he talked with elaborate gayety 
 of Frank Compton's latest domestic misfor- 
 tune, the discharge of Nora, his cook, for in- 
 temperance. " The poor fellow seems fated," 
 he ended. 
 
 There was an ominous silence, broken at 
 last by Marie, who asked him if he had seen 
 the children.
 
 116 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " The children ? No. Has anything hap- 
 pened to them ? " he asked anxiously. 
 
 '"Yes. Theodora has had their hair cut," 
 she announced in tragic tones. 
 
 " Oh, is that all ? " he said with relief. 
 
 " All ? " Marie's lip quivered, and she looked 
 at her husband reproachfully. She felt the 
 hot tears rising to her eyes, and she had a 
 desperate wish to keep from giving way be- 
 fore her sister-in-law. "You used to like 
 their curly hair," she managed to say. 
 
 " Marie," said Theodora, " I am very sorry 
 I had their hair cut, as I have spent the last 
 half hour in telling you, but the mischief is 
 done and cannot be undone." 
 
 " No, it can't," Marie assented drearily. 
 
 " It is better than if it had to be cut because 
 they had the typhoid fever," Edward sug- 
 gested soothingly. 
 
 At these words Marie precipitately left the 
 table. 
 
 " I am so sorry, Edward," Theodora said 
 penitently. " I suppose I ought to have con- 
 sulted her, but I never thought she would 
 take it in this way. It is all my fault." 
 
 " It is partly the heat," he said, " and she 
 has n't got back her strength."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 117 
 
 That night, as Edward soothed and com- 
 forted his wife, telling her she was dearer to 
 him than six Theodoras, he wondered gloomily 
 what the outcome of all this was to be. 
 
 " And, by the way," he proceeded with af- 
 fected cheerfulness, " think how grateful we 
 ought to be that I have n't half a dozen sisters, 
 dearest. Fancy six Theodoras planning our 
 life for us ! Let us remember to be thankful 
 for all our mercies." 
 
 " Edward, I wish you would ever take things 
 seriously." 
 
 He had been trying, poor fellow, not to take 
 things too seriously. " Little girl," he said 
 gently, " it was only the other night that you 
 told me I was too hard on her." 
 
 "I know she is good, but she is turning 
 me into a shrew. If she would only go away, 
 I think I could be myself again. How I wish 
 she would get married ! but she is so conscien- 
 tious she never will leave us for any other rea- 
 son, and there is nobody for her to marry." 
 
 " There is old Frank," he suggested. " The 
 poor fellow needs looking after sadly." 
 
 " Frank will never think of marrying again," 
 she said, shocked at her husband's levity.
 
 118 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 "She would just suit him," Edward went 
 on, pleased with this new idea, " for he likes 
 order and neatness and that sort of thing, 
 and he admires her immensely. He would be 
 much better off if he were married. Marie, I 
 have a brilliant idea ; I mean to offer him 
 Theodora ! "
 
 IX. 
 
 A FEW days after this conversation, Edward 
 was summoned to the telephone. 
 
 " Can't you come down and spend the even- 
 ning with me ? " Frank Compton asked. " I 
 haven't a servant in the house, and I can't 
 leave Essie." 
 
 "What 'sup now?" 
 
 " I '11 tell you when you come. I don't care 
 to shout my woes through the telephone." 
 
 " This is the worst yet," Frank said, as the 
 two friends were sitting together in his study. 
 " Marianne, whom I thought such a treasure, 
 and who was doing the cooking as well as her 
 own work, has decamped." 
 
 " You don't say so ! However, / don't call 
 decamping so bad as getting drunk." 
 
 " But she has gone off with a lot of our 
 spoons and forks. She was going to be mar- 
 ried and " 
 
 A shout of laughter interrupted his revela- 
 tions. " Going to be married, is she? Well,
 
 120 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 it is a good scheme to gather in a few wed- 
 ding presents. I am surprised that you don't 
 sympathize with her, Fanny, my love. Why 
 did n't you throw in the candlesticks, as the 
 good bishop did in ' Les Miserables ' ? Hon- 
 estly, Frank, don't you think she would have 
 found the candlesticks useful in her new 
 home?" 
 
 " You may laugh as much as you please," 
 Frank said in an offended tone, "but you 
 wouldn't find it a laughing matter if your 
 old family silver had been stolen." 
 
 " I wish somebody would steal our old fam- 
 ily letters. But, Frank, surely you can get it 
 again ? " 
 
 " I told you she had decamped. She is 
 married and starting for California by this 
 time." 
 
 " Tell me all about it. This is the most 
 thrilling thing yet." 
 
 " I noticed that there were very few pillow- 
 cases and towels in the linen closet, but Ma- 
 rianne assured me that there had been an 
 unusual number in the wash." 
 
 " And, having as great confidence in her as 
 you have in me, you could not doubt her sweet 
 face. I understand."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 121 
 
 " Two evenings ago she came to tell me that 
 she wanted to spend the night with her sick 
 sister. Of course I let her go, and when she 
 did not come back in the morning I supposed 
 Lizzie was worse, and so I did not send for 
 her until evening ; and Essie and I feasted on 
 canned things and crackers. After tea, Dr. 
 Reycroft, who had a patient living in the 
 neighborhood, offered to hunt her up, for I 
 could not leave Essie, and he returned with 
 the astounding intelligence that she had not 
 been near her sister. In the morning I went 
 there, and found Lizzie in an excited and tear- 
 ful state of mind " 
 
 " AVearing a gray gown, and a black hat 
 with red roses in it, I presume? " 
 
 " Come, don't sit 011 a fellow when he 's 
 down. She told me that Marianne had doubt- 
 less married that scamp of a Patrick O'Brien, 
 in spite of her numerous warnings and entrea- 
 ties, and started for California with him. I 
 went home with a sinking of the heart, for 
 I had a vision of pillow-cases and towels, and 
 I made an inventory of my possessions. My 
 stock of towels, pillow-cases, table-cloths, and 
 napkins was suspiciously low ; while half a
 
 122 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 dozen small forks, two large ones, half a dozen 
 teaspoons, and a little silver cream-pitcher that 
 was my mother's had vanished. It is n't so 
 much that I mind what she has taken " 
 
 " There you go again, Monseigneur Bien- 
 venu ! I was sure you would have given her 
 the candlesticks had you known of her contem- 
 plated departure." 
 
 " Will you keep quiet ? It is an awful 
 set-down to one's pride to find one's self so 
 mistaken in a face. Why, that girl had the 
 sweetest, the most honest and demure face in 
 the world. I trusted her with everything. And 
 how did she repay me ? She even went so far 
 as to plan refurnishing my study herself, and 
 ordering too much of everything, so that she 
 could have the remnants. That scheme did 
 not work, however." 
 
 " Women are deceitful creatures. It takes 
 one of their own sex to find them out. Both 
 Marie and Theo said they never liked that 
 girl's face. Theo went so far as to say that 
 she would not trust her out of her sight." 
 
 "Did she? I tell you, Ned, such an ex- 
 perience makes one marvel at the intuition 
 of women, and at their brains, too. It takes
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 123 
 
 the brain of a Napoleon to run a house. I 
 would rather write twenty sermons than keep 
 house one week ; yet keeping house is a 
 thing which has been thrust upon me, and 
 is likely to stay with me to the end of the 
 chapter, for I can't board, on account of 
 Essie." 
 
 " Why don't you try another housekeeper ? " 
 
 " That is worse than anything else. Why, 
 oh why, did my sister ever get married ? " 
 
 " Why don't you get married ? " 
 
 " I ? I have so much to offer a woman ! 
 Not that I have n't thought of it ; and last 
 night I was so desperate that I was ready 
 to offer myself in turn to every woman in 
 the parish until I found one who would take 
 me." 
 
 " You would n't have to go far." 
 
 " What do you mean ? " 
 
 " I mean the first woman you lighted upon 
 would be only too glad to take you." 
 
 " Don't, Ned ; I can't stand you when you 
 are like that. Women are not so anxious to* 
 marry." 
 
 " Did I say they were ? I merely meant 
 that you are uncommonly attractive to the
 
 124 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 sex. And honestly, Frank, any woman would 
 be a fool not to take you." 
 
 " I 'm much obliged for your good opinion, 
 but I happen to be equally sure that any wo- 
 man would be a fool to take me. It would be 
 an awkward matter to ask a woman to be your 
 wife when you were not in love with her." 
 
 " It would, rather," Edward admitted ; " but 
 you might strike one who was unromantic." 
 
 " Ned, you little appreciate your blessings, 
 with a wife and sister both devoted to you, 
 and ready to shield you from the wear and 
 tear of every-day life. I have spent my whole 
 day in the intelligence-offices in Boston, and 
 I can't find any ' lady ' who will be willing, 
 for love or money, to ' accommodate ' me until 
 my summer vacation." 
 
 " Don't you want Theodora to go to the in- 
 telligence-offices for you ? She got a splendid 
 servant for us. She has a way with them, and 
 she has wonderful insight into character." 
 
 " She has indeed," said Frank, with a lit- 
 tle laugh that Edward supposed merely re- 
 lated to Marianne. " But, Ned, I could never 
 allow your sister to do a thing of that kind for 
 me."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 125 
 
 " She 'd like it. Theo has a morbid love of 
 being of use ! and if she were to run down to 
 Boston for a day, that would give me a holi- 
 day. You don't appreciate your blessings in 
 not having to keep your nose at the grind- 
 stone." 
 
 " That is good ! You merely copy old let- 
 ters for two hours in the morning. What 
 would you say if you had to write a sermon 
 every week and run a parish, besides running 
 your house ? " 
 
 " I should blow my brains out, Fanny, my 
 love, or else," he added boldly, " I should 
 marry Theodora Davidson." 
 
 " How dare you ! " 
 
 " I am not sure that I should dare ; it would 
 take a good deal of courage." 
 
 " Your sister is " 
 
 " A fine girl, but unromantic, quite unro- 
 mantic, Fanny dear, which in this case I 
 should say would be a good thing. She has a 
 perfect genius for running a house, and she 
 ought to have a home of her own. She loves 
 to sacrifice herself, too. Indeed, in my long 
 experience of this wicked world, I don't think 
 I have ever known any one who was so good.
 
 126 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 By the way, you were not at town-meeting 
 the other night ? " 
 
 " No, it was Marianne's evening out, and I 
 had to stay with Essie." 
 
 " You didn't miss much." 
 
 They discussed the town-meeting and kin- 
 dred subjects for an hour or more, during 
 which time Frank was very absent. 
 
 When Edward rose to go, he said carelessly, 
 " Well, Frank, shall Theo get you a couple 
 of servants to-morrow ? " 
 
 " No," his friend implied with a hot flush. 
 " I could not think of troubling Miss David- 
 son." 
 
 " These household developments must have 
 a bad effect upon Essie," Edward called back 
 insinuatingly from the doorstep. 
 
 " They have. I am very much worried 
 about her, for she is a nervous, excitable lit- 
 tle thing." 
 
 " If he does take up with my suggestion, it 
 will be a mighty good thing for us, and it will 
 be a good thing for him, too," Edward re- 
 flected, as he wended his way home. " It is a 
 great deal better to have your house kept by 
 a woman who manages it too well than to 
 have no one to keep it at all."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 127 
 
 Of course Mr. Compton's parishioners were 
 immensely kind during his tribulations, and 
 invitations to dinner and tea came in for him 
 and Essie by the score. They took most of 
 their dinners with the Davidsons, and Frank 
 had a conscious manner whenever he was in 
 Theodora's company. Sometimes he would 
 sit for five minutes with his eyes fixed on her 
 face while she was sewing or reading, for 
 she always went on with her own pursuits if 
 Marie or Edward was present to entertain 
 him. If she chanced to glance up and find 
 his eyes upon her, he would change color. 
 His blushes annoyed her. She thought that 
 a man who was more than thirty years old 
 ought to have gained sufficient self-control to 
 prevent such an obvious sign of embarrass- 
 ment. To be sure, he had an uncommonly 
 fair complexion. She could not account for 
 this sudden change in his demeanor. If she 
 had been another kind of woman, and he 
 a different sort of man, she would have 
 fancied that he was in love with her ; but as 
 she had never had a lover, and as his affec- 
 tions were known to be irretrievably appropri- 
 ated, the idea merely flashed into her mind
 
 128 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 to be dismissed as preposterous. She finally 
 settled down to the belief that some officious 
 parishioner must have coupled her name with 
 his, and, having accepted this theory, she made 
 an effort to be more friendly than usual, that 
 he might see how needless it was to feel any 
 embarrassment in her society. 
 
 Frank's trips to the intelligence-office were 
 at last productive of one old woman, with very 
 poor sight and an equally bad disposition, 
 who kindly condescended to make his house 
 her home until his vacation. There was no 
 reason now why he should not have his meals, 
 such as they were, at home ; but while this 
 simplified life, it did not add to its gayety, for 
 although a dinner of herbs, where love is, is 
 better than a stalled ox and hatred therewith, 
 it is generally admitted that a stalled ox is a 
 decided improvement upon a dinner of herbs, 
 provided the love in the two cases is equal. 
 It was a little depressing to settle back to 
 poor dinners, enlivened merely by his turbu- 
 lent little daughter, after the pleasant glimpses 
 into the outside world, and the delicious fare, 
 that his varied meals had afforded. 
 
 The most sympathetic of Mr. Compton's
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 129 
 
 many friends, with the exception of the David- 
 sons, were his next-door neighbors, the Rey- 
 crofts. Dr. Reycroft was a small, slightly built 
 man, with a slouching gait and an uncommonly 
 plain face. In spite of these disadvantages, 
 however, he produced the impression of hav- 
 ing unusual power. His patients were often 
 afraid of him, for he was sometimes brusque 
 and sarcastic, but they never questioned his 
 skill. After having railed at marriage for 
 many years, he suddenly took the town by 
 storm by becoming engaged, when he was 
 past fifty, to Helen Gordon, a gentle, unselfish 
 woman, who was no longer young, and who 
 never had been beautiful. It proved* a most 
 happy marriage, and turned the doctor from a 
 detractor of women into their ardent cham- 
 pion. Helen Reycroft and Theodora were on 
 some of the same committees, and a strong 
 friendship had grown up between them. Mr. 
 Compton and Essie had taken their break- 
 fasts with the Reycrofts during their cheer- 
 less condition, and a meal seldom passed 
 without some allusion to Miss Davidson. Dr. 
 Reycroft often spoke with enthusiasm of her 
 practical ability as director of the new hospi-
 
 130 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 tal, and Mrs. Reycroft descanted upon her 
 good judgment, or her sincerity, or her devo- 
 tion in friendship. 
 
 "Compton, you ought to marry again," 
 Dr. Reycroft said abruptly one night, as the 
 two friends walked home from the village 
 together. They had paused as they reached 
 the doctor's gate. " When I see that cheerful 
 light in my house, and think of all it means to 
 me, and then look next door at your blank 
 walls, it is more than I can stand." 
 
 " You did n't always hold these views about 
 marriage," the younger man returned with a 
 smile. 
 
 " I have been converted, my boy. I was a 
 fool for thirty years, but that does not make 
 me any more lenient to another fellow's folly." 
 
 " I have had my chance." 
 
 " Look here, Compton, romance and con- 
 stancy are mighty fine things, but they are 
 not especially ' filling for the price.' Won't 
 you come in ? " 
 
 " No, thank you ; I must go home and write 
 my sermon." 
 
 The doctor's face suddenly became radiant 
 at this point, for a graceful woman in a lilac
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 131 
 
 gown appeared in the doorway, holding a 
 lamp in her hand. 
 
 "I'm coming directly, Helen," he called 
 out. " Good-night, Coinpton ; I 'in sorry you 
 can't make us a call," and he strode hastily 
 into the brightness, while Compton let himself 
 into his lonely house.
 
 " Miss DAVIDSON, I wonder if you would 
 like to climb to the top of the hill with me? " 
 Frank Compton asked, a few days later. 
 " There is a fine view, and it is a glorious 
 afternoon for a walk." 
 
 Theodora shut the book which she had been 
 reading, and rose with alacrity, for she was 
 always ready for a climb. 
 
 It was Marie's birthday, and the Davidsons, 
 Mrs. Reycroft, and the Comptons had gone 
 on a picnic up the river. They had finished 
 the appetizing repast that had been set out in 
 the wood on the border of the stream, and 
 Edward had taken the children for a row, 
 while Marie and Mrs. Reycroft were making 
 a sketch of the three graceful arches of the 
 stone bridge and the drooping willows. 
 
 The rocky path taken by Frank and Theo-. 
 dora was hedged in by a tangle of bushes and 
 some young maples, which were still so small 
 that they seemed like a grove for children.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 133 
 
 It was impossible to do much talking until 
 they came out on the broad, open stretch of 
 the hilltop, when they turned and looked 
 back at a charming view. Far below them 
 the river wound its tranquil way between 
 banks of unmown grass, sprinkled with white 
 daisies, yellow buttercups, and pink clover ; 
 and farther down the stream, the town of 
 Edgecomb, with its white houses and two 
 slender white spires, made a peaceful picture 
 in the frame of the landscape. A long way 
 off, they could see the miniature white vil- 
 lage that was consecrated to the dead, but at 
 this distance the dwelling-place of the living 
 seemed equally dream-like and silent. 
 
 " How beautiful it is ! " said Theodora. 
 
 " Yes," Frank assented. " Sometimes I 
 think this peaceful Massachusetts farming 
 country, with its low hills and its green fields 
 that seem so suggestive of prosperity, is more 
 beautiful than the sterner New England of 
 the north." 
 
 Theodora settled herself comfortably in a 
 nook in the hillside, and took out the small 
 book that she had slipped into the bag that 
 hung from the belt of her blue serge gown.
 
 134 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Miss Davidson," her companion expostu- 
 lated, " do you think it polite to read when I 
 have invited you to take this walk? I want 
 you to devote yourself to me." 
 
 " I was going to read aloud something that 
 I am sure you will like." 
 
 " What have you there ? Sill's poems ? I 
 am surprised that you care for his poetry." 
 
 " What an unflattering opinion you must 
 have of my taste ! To me ' Field Notes ' is 
 the most beautiful poem about nature that I 
 know. Listen to this : 
 
 " ' So all that day 
 
 In the lap of the green earth I lay, 
 And drinking of the sunshine's flood.' " 
 
 She read the rest of that verse and a part 
 of the next : 
 
 " ' Were men all wise and -women true, 
 Might youth as calm as manhood be, 
 And might calm manhood keep its lore 
 And still be young, and, one thing more, 
 Old Earth were fair enough for me.' " 
 
 " I suspect it is the ' one thing more ' that 
 most of us miss," he broke in. " However, 
 there are some fortunate beings who seem to 
 have exactly what they want. You, for in-
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 135 
 
 stance, are particularly well placed, for you 
 have many of the privileges of a married 
 woman without her responsibilities." 
 
 " Oh, but nothing is mine," she cried, with 
 a sudden ring of pain in her voice. " I can't 
 do what I should like for the children, be- 
 cause the methods of their father and mother 
 are so opposed to mine. Of course it is a 
 delight to live with my brother, but I some- 
 times feel like an outsider ; it can't but be 
 different from what it was when we were 
 growing up together." 
 
 " You are all the more necessary to him. 
 The life of your household seems ideal to me. 
 Mrs. Davidson is the most charming woman 
 in the world, but she is not very practical, 
 whereas you " 
 
 " Whereas I am not the most charming 
 woman in the world, but I am practical," she 
 said, with a little smile. " Yes, I have the 
 satisfaction of knowing that they need me." 
 
 Frank looked earnestly at her strong face. 
 She had that indescribable attraction that 
 comes from a fine physique and an absence of 
 self-consciousness, while certain contradictions 
 in her character suggested reserves of feeling
 
 136 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 that made her interesting. To-day she seemed 
 overflowing with health, and moral and physi- 
 cal strength, and she was as refreshing and 
 stimulating as mountain air to her more 
 highly strung and sensitive companion. 
 
 " I am afraid I gave you the idea that I 
 am not entirely happy," she said presently. 
 "I am very. contented, as a general thing, 
 only the occupation of filling in gaps is not 
 so exciting to the filler as it seems to the spec- 
 tator. Still it is a comfort to have gaps to 
 fill; only married people seem so sufficient 
 to themselves." 
 
 " Do you ever wish that you were mar- 
 ried ? " he inquired abruptly. 
 
 " It has never come near enough to me for 
 me to think much about it, but I am sure that 
 marriage is almost always the happiest lot for 
 a woman." 
 
 "Do you really think so?" he asked im- 
 pulsively. 
 
 " Yes," she answered, vexed to feel the color 
 rising to her face. 
 
 " Miss Davidson, do you suppose that you 
 could ever like me well enough to be my 
 wife ? "
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 137 
 
 " Mr. Compton ! " The two words con- 
 tained a whole language of meaning. 
 
 " I did n't intend to ask you in this blunt 
 fashion. I had n't any idea of saying any- 
 thing about it at present, and I suppose I 
 have startled, perhaps shocked you ; but if 
 you knew how wretched I have been of late, 
 and how worried about Essie, and what a 
 comfort you are to me with your calm tem- 
 perament and your practical ways, and how 
 much I like you " 
 
 " But you do not love me ! " 
 
 He hesitated for a moment, and then looked 
 straight at her with an appealing glance. " I 
 don't want to deceive you," he began, " and I 
 suppose it is only fair to say that I never can 
 care for any woman as I once cared ; but I 
 like you immensely, and the older I grow the 
 more sure I feel that a strong friendship 
 between a man and a woman is a good basis 
 for marriage, supposing there is no possibility 
 for the other thing. It isn't as if we were 
 either of us very young." 
 
 " I don't know how it is with you," said 
 Theodora, " I can't put myself in your place ; 
 but I know that at twenty-nine I have the
 
 138 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 possibility of loving, and that I should not 
 think it right to marry unless I did love, and 
 that I do not love you." 
 
 " I suppose you despise me ? " he remarked 
 after a little pause. 
 
 " I don't despise you ; on the contrary, I 
 feel very sorry for you. You must have suf- 
 fered a great deal of annoyance before you, 
 a romantic and chivalrous person by nature, 
 could have made up your mind to do a thing 
 like this." 
 
 " Please don't ! you have made me feel con- 
 temptible enough already." 
 
 " I did n't mean to make you feel con- 
 temptible ; I only want you to realize that 
 there is one thing worse than loving again, 
 and that is to marry without love." 
 
 He was silent. She rose as she spoke, and 
 began to walk hastily towards the path that 
 led down the hillside. 
 
 " Do you despise me too thoroughly to be 
 my friend any more ? " he asked humbly. 
 
 " No. I am willing to be as much your 
 friend as I have ever been." 
 
 The humor in the situation appealed to him 
 at this point, and he gave a short laugh, which 
 irritated Theodora.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 139 
 
 " ' Were men all wise and women true,' " he 
 quoted. " I don't think either you or I can 
 be accused of rhetorical flourishes. If you 
 had n't been the most truthful woman I know, 
 I should not have told you the truth in this 
 bald way ; but you are so honest and straight- 
 forward that I did not think it fair not to be 
 absolutely frank with you, and you seemed so 
 unromantic and so sensible that I thought " 
 
 She did not come to his assistance, and he 
 lamely left the sentence unfinished. 
 
 Theodora paused for a moment to look down 
 at the view. She could not help thinking of 
 the fascinating Estelle Compton, the " beloved 
 wife," who lay buried in that distant cemetery, 
 and of the passionate attachment which had 
 preceded her marriage. It seemed the irony 
 of fate that Francis Compton, the hero of that 
 romance, a man full of feeling and sentiment, 
 should make her this bald offer, unadorned by 
 any pretense of love, and that she, the practical 
 and matter-of-fact Theodora Davidson, should 
 find it insufficient. 
 
 She began to walk swiftly down the path, 
 but her progress was stayed by a blackberry- 
 bush which caught in the folds of her gown.
 
 140 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 She paused to extricate herself, and, as she 
 glanced back, she saw Frank Coinpton's for- 
 lorn and dispirited face a little above her. 
 
 " Miss Davidson," he began, " I said what I 
 had to say very clumsily, but I am desper- 
 ately unhappy ; that is the truth of the mat- 
 ter. I never should have had the audacity 
 to ask you what I did, however, if you had 
 seemed wholly satisfied with your own life. I 
 had always supposed you were perfectly con- 
 tented, and then this afternoon, when you 
 spoke of sometimes feeling like an outsider, 
 and of I thought I was a fool, of course 
 I thought that perhaps we could be hap- 
 pier together than apart. I thought " 
 
 " Don't think any more about it," she said, 
 impatiently cutting short his halting speech; 
 then she added more gently, " Happiness is not 
 entirely over for a man when he is only a little 
 past thirty. You will be a great deal hap- 
 pier some day than you are now ; only, no 
 matter how desperate you may get, don't ever 
 fancy again that you have the right to ask a 
 woman to marry you when you have merely 
 a cold regard for her domestic virtues." 
 
 " Miss Davidson, you do me injustice."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 141 
 
 She did not reply to this observation, but 
 walked quickly down the hill, that she might 
 put an end to the interview. 
 
 In the watches of the night she reproached 
 herself for her severity. She knew that it had 
 arisen, not so much from the fact that an offer 
 had been made in which there was no love, but 
 from the circumstance that the offer had been 
 made to her. It gave her a sore and angry 
 feeling to think that she was so different from 
 the rest of her sex that a man had dared to 
 tell her that he supposed her too sensible to 
 care for love and romance. She thought of 
 her own prosaic girlhood, as free from all dis- 
 tractions of sentiment as if there had been 
 no men in the world, and contrasted it with 
 Marie's youth, which had been filled with a 
 succession of romances. She herself did not 
 want a succession of romances ; she would have 
 been content with one true lover. She knew 
 that she could love devotedly, but this latent 
 capacity in her nature had never been called 
 out. Frank Compton was not the man to do 
 it; he was weaker than she. She could not 
 love a man who was not stronger than herself, 
 and yet it was astonishing how the fact of the
 
 142 THE COMING OF THEODOBA. 
 
 offer, bald and prosaic though it was, softened 
 her feelings towards him. After all, he had 
 not been so much to blame. What was the 
 poor man to do ? He honestly believed that 
 he could not love again, but was he therefore 
 to lead a lonely life always, and a life full of 
 petty cares, when he had it in his power to 
 materially improve his condition? His con- 
 duct was not ideal, certainly, but this was not 
 an ideal world. Alas, alas ! it was far from 
 an ideal world ! She thought again of Marie. 
 Had she been free, how easily Frank Compton 
 could have fallen in love with her ! How little 
 would he have dared to talk of quiet friend- 
 ship ! At one glance from Marie's brown 
 eyes, an appealing, conscious glance, he would 
 have thrown his old scruples of constancy to 
 the winds, and he would have loved her, if she 
 had been free. There were plenty of Marie 
 Davidsons, and before long some pretty girl 
 with a taste for flirtation would make Frank 
 Compton forget the past. Why was she her- 
 self so different from other women? She was 
 fine-looking, she was intelligent, she was effi- 
 cient, and she was not unattractive to men ; 
 they liked her as they liked an aunt or a sister.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 143 
 
 Was there no place in the economy of the 
 world for a sensible woman, except in virtually 
 joining the ranks of the men ? It was unfair. 
 She, too, would like to love and to marry, and 
 to be loved devotedly in return. But it was 
 not to be. And why? On account of her 
 very virtues ; simply because she was so high- 
 minded that she scorned flirtation and affecta- 
 tion. This was how she put it to herself in the 
 watches of the night. She would like a strong, 
 manly, ardent lover, and instead of this she 
 had had an offer without love from the gentlest 
 and most feminine of his sex. She had a burn- 
 ing sense of envy of the women like Marie 
 who could please so easily that to charm be- 
 came to them a thing of course. It was simply 
 impossible for her to marry without love, and 
 it was equally impossible for her to love Frank 
 Compton, even supposing he had loved her ; 
 but she wished that she were a weak woman 
 instead of a strong one. She wished, for once 
 in her life, that she were a fragile, dependent, 
 even a frivolous girl. 
 
 " Look here, Theo," her brother asked her 
 the next morning, " what did Frank say to 
 you yesterday ? You both looked so terribly
 
 144 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 conscious when you came down that hill that 
 I could have sworn that he had been offering 
 you nothing less than his hand and heart." 
 
 "Not that exactly." 
 
 " Theodora, I don't want to seem officious 
 or meddlesome, but if Frank ever should say 
 anything of that kind to you, I want just 
 to mention that he is the finest fellow I know, 
 and that any girl would be lucky to get him." 
 
 " Edward," said Theodora, " you once told 
 me that I could live with you always, and you 
 can set your mind quite at ease on the subject 
 of my ever wanting to do anything else."
 
 XI. 
 
 IF it was not so satisfactory to have Theo- 
 dora permanently under his roof as Edward 
 had once fondly dreamed it would be, never- 
 theless there were compensations which he 
 was quick to seize. To be unhappy was so 
 foreign to his nature that it was a necessity 
 for him to make the best of any inevitable sit- 
 uation. In the old days he could seldom leave 
 home, for, unexacting as Marie was in many 
 respects, she demanded his constant companion- 
 ship. There was no reason now, he told him- 
 self half guiltily, why he should not occasion- 
 ally go off on little pleasure trips, as he could 
 leave his sister with Marie and the children. 
 Accordingly, one day in early June, he casually 
 remarked to his wife that he had agreed to go 
 with some friends to the Rangeley Lakes for a 
 fortnight's fishing trip. He was prepared to 
 meet with the opposition that he received, and 
 he could not bear to make Marie unhappy in 
 her weak and nervous state, but it had come
 
 146 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 to a point where lie must choose between mak- 
 ing her unhappy and being unhappy himself. 
 Home was no longer the charming, restful 
 spot it had once been ; and if Theo was to live 
 with them always, and persist in making him 
 write biography when the thermometer was 
 95 in the shade, why, hang it ! he must take 
 an occasional vacation. 
 
 Marie was in despair at the idea of a fort- 
 night of Theodora's society without Edward. 
 She was of so sensitive a nature that she was 
 as fully aware of her disapproval as if she had 
 told her all that was in her heart ; but Theo- 
 dora was too little introspective, perhaps also 
 too unconscious and healthy-minded, to be sen- 
 sitive. It did not often occur to her to think 
 whether she was liked or disliked, and it cer- 
 tainly never occurred to her to fancy that her 
 sister-in-law disliked her. Why should she, 
 when she, Theodora, was devoted to her and 
 the children with her whole heart and soul? 
 She was blind to all the little signs that would 
 have led a more sensitive woman to question 
 the strength of her position, and was not in 
 the least dismayed at the thought of a fort- 
 night alone with her brother's wife, for Marie
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 147 
 
 could be a charming companion in spite of her 
 faults. 
 
 When Edward went away on his journey, 
 he knew that he departed under the cloud of 
 Marie's disapproval, and this made him un- 
 happy, as he longed for the contentment of 
 the whole world, and especially for that of 
 his wife ; but, unfortunately, we cannot have 
 every circumstance propitious, and he was 
 forced to be satisfied with his sister's hearty 
 sympathy. 
 
 Edward's absence was prolonged beyond 
 the two weeks, as Marie had felt sure it would 
 be, and she received only a few lines from him 
 at rare intervals. In her nervous state she 
 worked herself into a white heat of worry, 
 having each day a presentiment that some ac- 
 cident had happened to her husband, until a 
 tardy letter would assure her of his exuberant 
 health and spirits, and then dreading that in 
 his new-found liberty he would grow tired of 
 the restraints of home. She grew paler and 
 weaker so rapidly that even Theodora was at 
 length alarmed. 
 
 " Marie, you must go to bed early and get 
 a good, long night's sleep," she said one even-
 
 148 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 ing when Edward had been away for almost a 
 month. " I can't have you looking so ill when 
 my brother comes back." 
 
 " It does not signify how I look," Marie 
 replied coldly, as she bent over the stocking 
 that she was darning. 
 
 The sharpness of a uniformly sweet-tem- 
 pered person is always a disconcerting surprise, 
 and Theodora took up her book in perturbed 
 silence. " Poor little thing ! how she must be 
 worrying about him to answer me like that ! " 
 she thought, and she said : " Marie, it is only 
 eight days since we have heard from Edward, 
 and he did n't write for almost a week once 
 before, so I don't think there is any reason to 
 be anxious about him. It is simply that he 
 hates to write letters." 
 
 " Why should I worry about Edward ? " 
 Marie asked petulantly. 
 
 Theodora's presence was intolerable to her. 
 Her optimism, her obtuseness, her blindness 
 to Edward's faults, all united to make her 
 a most aggravating companion ; for poor 
 Marie was analyzing her husband pitilessly, 
 as she had never done before. " He lives in 
 the present," she thought. "When I am a
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 149 
 
 part of his present he is fond of me, but as 
 soon as he leaves ine he forgets me. He has 
 written to me just four times in all these 
 weeks, and I have written to him every day. 
 I am an incident in his life, whereas he is my 
 world. It is Theodora who is responsible," 
 she reflected bitterly, "for if she had not 
 been here to make his home uncomfortable, 
 he would have been content to have me a part 
 of his present always. I know how it will end. 
 He is so clever, and those men like him so 
 much, that he will go away from me more and 
 more, until I am nothing to him. Oh, Theo- 
 dora, good woman that you are, what harm 
 you have wrought ! " 
 
 "Let me mend those stockings," begged 
 Theodora, " and that will give you time to 
 read." 
 
 Marie turned a white face towards her, but 
 she controlled herself with an effort and said, 
 in her usual sweet tones, " You are very kind, 
 but I don't care to read." 
 
 " Give me one at least, then ; " and Theodora 
 reached over and took up a small, almost heel- 
 less black stocking. 
 
 Marie snatched it away. " I like to do
 
 150 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 them, and I have plenty of time. You are 
 very good, dear," she added gently, " but I 
 have been letting you do too many things." 
 
 " Oh, no, indeed ! I love dearly to do 
 things for you, if that is all " She ended 
 her sentence by forcibly taking possession of 
 the little stocking. 
 
 There was a long silence, while Theodora 
 darned away neatly and swiftly on one side of 
 the table, and Marie took slow, ineffective 
 stitches on the other. These silences were 
 growing longer and longer every evening. 
 It was a stormy night, and the wind was blow- 
 ing the rain in great gusts against the window- 
 panes. 
 
 " How pleasant it is by this cheerful fire ! " 
 said Theodora at last. " I am glad we are 
 not out in the storm." 
 
 " I should like to be out in it." As Marie 
 spoke, one gust more furious than the rest 
 fairly shook the house. 
 
 " Is n't that the door-bell ? " Theodora asked 
 presently. " One can hardly hear it through 
 this tempest." 
 
 " Yes, it is the door-bell," Marie assented ; 
 *' some one has ventured out," and both women
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 151 
 
 had a feeling of relief that their tete-a-tete 
 was to be interrupted. 
 
 "Mr. Compton is here," the maid an- 
 nounced. " He wants to see you in the entry, 
 Miss Theodora. He is so wet that he won't 
 come in." 
 
 As Theodora went out of the room with 
 heightened color, Marie had a sickening fore- 
 boding that he had come to urge her sister- 
 in-law to marry him. Marie had a firmly 
 rooted disbelief in all second marriages, but 
 in this case she felt it positive sacrilege for 
 Frank Compton to dream of putting another 
 woman in his wife's place ; and, as if to aggra- 
 vate the keen pain which the thought of his 
 defection gave her, came the swift certainty 
 that Theodora would make him miserable. 
 
 When the sound of their low voices ceased, 
 and the front door opened and shut, Marie 
 went out into the hall. 
 
 " I am going to see if the children are prop- 
 erly covered up," she said. 
 
 "Let me go for you," begged Theodora, 
 as she hastily thrust something into the table 
 drawer. " By the way, Mr. Compton wanted 
 to know if Dora and Gladys could dine with 
 Essie to-morrow."
 
 152 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " On Sunday ? He never has any one there 
 on Sunday." 
 
 As she spoke, her eyes wandered to the 
 table drawer. In her haste, Theodora had not 
 done her work thoroughly, and half an inch of 
 tell-tale magenta paper was visible. At sight 
 of it the current of Marie's thoughts changed 
 with lightning-like rapidity. 
 
 " That is a Pathfinder," she said. " Why 
 did Frank bring it here? Is Edward ill?" 
 
 Theodora hesitated. 
 
 " What has happened ? Tell me what has 
 happened at once ! " Marie demanded breath- 
 lessly. 
 
 " My dear child, I would have spared you 
 this to-night if I could. It is nothing serious," 
 she added hastily, as she caught a glimpse of 
 Marie's blanched face. " Edward fell and cut 
 his hand on a rock a week ago. At first they 
 thought it of no account, but he was careless, 
 and it is badly inflamed, and he is a little 
 feverish, so, as his friends have had to come 
 home, I am going to him on Monday." 
 
 " You ? I shall go to him." 
 
 " My dear child, that would be simply sui- 
 cidal. You are not well enough to take the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 153 
 
 journey, and would be too used up by the time 
 you reached Camp Bemis to nurse Edward. 
 Mr. Compton and I have planned it all. He 
 came to say that he would gladly take care of 
 the children if we felt we could both leave 
 home, but I told him that you would not be 
 strong enough to go." 
 
 " Tell me all you know," Marie entreated 
 piteously. " What did Frank say ? How did 
 he hear? Edward must be very ill. I am 
 sure you are keeping something back. It will 
 kiU me." 
 
 " I am keeping nothing back. You can see 
 for yourself just how things are ; here is the 
 letter." 
 
 Marie devoured its contents eagerly. " And 
 both those men have left him," she cried in- 
 dignantly. "It is what might have been ex- 
 pected. Theodora, how can you take it so 
 quietly? Think of the poor fellow suffering 
 there without his friends, and too ill to come 
 home ! Think of it, Theodora ! And we have 
 been calmly living on, knowing nothing of it ! 
 They ought to have telegraphed to us at once." 
 
 " Don't you see that at first they thought it 
 a mere scratch ? They are not worried about
 
 154 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 him now, or they would not have left him, 
 but I shall feel easier to go to him. This was 
 why he has not written, for it was his right 
 hand." 
 
 Marie sank down on the parlor sofa, and 
 buried her face in her hands. " Poor boy ! " 
 she moaned. " Yes, this was why he has not 
 written, and I thought I fancied Is n't 
 there a Sunday train ? I must go to him at 
 once. Wounds are so dangerous ! Blood-poi- 
 soning may set in, and he may die." 
 
 " My dear, don't get so excited ; there is 
 no danger of that. There is no Sunday train, 
 but on Monday " 
 
 " It is easy for you to be calm, for he is not 
 your husband. You do not love him better 
 than any one in the whole world." 
 
 " Marie, I do love him better than any one 
 in the whole world." 
 
 " You do not love him as I love him ! I 
 love him so much that heaven itself would be 
 a wretched place without him, and hell would 
 be heaven with him ! " 
 
 " My dear child, you must n't talk in this 
 wild way. You poor thing, you are trembling 
 all over. I wanted to prevent this, and not let
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 155 
 
 you know of the accident until to-morrow, for 
 I feared "- 
 
 " I would rather know to-night ; you ought 
 to have told me the first minute. Theodora, I 
 can bear things ; I am not a child." 
 
 " No, but you are an invalid just now, and 
 consequently you are easily upset Go to bed, 
 dear, and try to get some sleep." 
 
 "Sleep?" 
 
 " Yes, you must sleep for his sake, so as to 
 be strong and well when he comes back to 
 you." 
 
 " I shall go to him." 
 
 " Marie, be reasonable. Dr. Reycroft will 
 not let you go. There is no need of worrying, 
 for Mr. Hunt says particularly that there hap- 
 pens to be an excellent doctor at the camp, 
 and I shall take such good care of Edward 
 that he can come back to you in a few days." 
 
 Poor Marie felt utterly powerless before her 
 sister-in-law's strong will. Her one wish was 
 to "escape to her own room, where she could 
 think in quiet : she must feign a calmness that 
 she did not feel, and then I 
 
 " Theodora," she observed quietly, " as you 
 say, there is no use in worrying ; it will be
 
 156 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 much more sensible for me to go to bed and 
 to sleep." 
 
 This abrupt change of manner surprised 
 Theodora, but did not arouse her suspicions. 
 She herself felt very anxious concerning Ed- 
 ward, but she was thankful to have partially 
 allayed Marie's fears. 
 
 " Good-night, dear," she said tenderly, and 
 she kissed her. 
 
 " Good-night, dear," Marie echoed, passively 
 letting herself be kissed.
 
 XII. 
 
 WHEN Marie was in her own room, she 
 threw herself down on the bed and pressed 
 her hands to her burning head. 
 
 " I hate her ! I hate her ! " she repeated 
 over and over again. " And I let her kiss me, 
 hypocrite that I am ! Oh, how I wish that 
 she would go away and never, never come 
 back ! And she talks about my nerves, when 
 it is she who has broken me in body, mind, 
 and soul! But I will go to my husband, I 
 will, I will ! " 
 
 She rose, and went stealthily about the 
 room, taking a wrap and a hat out of her 
 closet. The wind was still blowing a gale, but 
 the rain had almost ceased. She stole down- 
 stairs, and letting herself out of the front door, 
 locked it and slipped the key into her pocket. 
 She could hear Theodora's step, and glanced 
 fearfully up at her window, as if she expected 
 even now to be detected and called back. It 
 was half past ten o'clock, and the lights had
 
 158 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 disappeared from the neighboring houses. She 
 had never been out alone so late in Edgeconib, 
 and the darkness terrified her. When she came 
 to the centre of the town, she grew still more 
 frightened, and longed for the friendly quiet 
 of the street she had left, for some of the 
 liquor-saloons were not yet closed, and a group 
 of disorderly loafers was sitting on the church 
 steps. They glanced at her offensively as she 
 went by. She trembled more and more as she 
 sped past the shops and into the dark, silent 
 thoroughfare beyond them. A great dog that 
 sprang out from behind some bushes snapped 
 at her, and a drunken man reeled towards her 
 and almost touched her. She walked faster 
 and faster, until she at last reached the parson- 
 age gate. She could see that Mr. Compton 
 was still up, for there was a light in his study 
 window. She sank half exhausted upon the 
 doorsteps to get her breath. 
 
 The minister was finishing the last para- 
 graph of his sermon when he heard a faint, 
 tremulous ring. He went to the door himself. 
 " Mrs. Davidson ! " he exclaimed in surprise ; 
 " I did not recognize you at first, for it is so 
 dark outside."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 159 
 
 "I don't wonder you did not know me," 
 Marie said tremulously, as she pinned up her 
 disheveled hair. " I don't seem to know my- 
 self." 
 
 He ushered her into his study, and pushed 
 forward a leather armchair before the smoul- 
 dering fire. " Miss Davidson has told you 
 the news ? " he asked. 
 
 " Yes, I made her tell me." 
 
 " And you have come to see if I have been 
 keeping anything back ? I know nothing more 
 than you do. I am sure there is no cause for 
 undue worry ; and yet I don't wonder that 
 the news upset you." 
 
 His gentleness and sympathy were too much 
 for poor Marie, who began to cry furtively. 
 
 He went out of the room to give her time 
 to recover her self-possession, and came back 
 presently with some milk biscuits and a glass 
 of wine. 
 
 " Oh, you are so good to me," she said with 
 a little sob. 
 
 " I ? good to you ? I can never forget the 
 many times that you and Ned have been kinder 
 to me than words can tell." 
 
 " You must think me a fool," Marie began,
 
 160 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 after a long pause, " but I knew I could n't 
 sleep until I found out whether you had any 
 more news ; and besides, besides " 
 
 " Besides ? " he echoed kindly, " what can I 
 do for you besides ? " 
 
 She hesitated for a moment, and then said, 
 " You can make Theodora let me go to my 
 husband." 
 
 " But, Mrs. Davidson, I don't understand. 
 If you tell your sister that you wish to go too, 
 it can easily be arranged." 
 
 " I don't want to go with Theodora. I 
 mean we can't both leave the children. She 
 is determined to go. She thinks she will be 
 more useful, and that I am not strong 
 enough." 
 
 "Of course you want to do whatever is 
 best for him." 
 
 " That is just the point," she said eagerly. 
 " I have a quieting effect over Ned, whereas 
 Theodora she is so strong that she might not 
 make allowance for his weakness. Sometimes 
 I think I shall be insane if I cannot go to 
 him," she added piteously, as she raised her 
 beautiful, appealing eyes to his. 
 
 " And yet, if it is best to have your 
 sister "
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA 161 
 
 " Mr. Conipton," she interrupted, " remem- 
 ber how you felt when your wife was living ; " 
 and she glanced up at the picture of the dark- 
 haired girl with the passionate, earnest eyes. 
 
 He looked at it, too, and there was a sud- 
 den change in his expression. Marie did not 
 see it, for her eyes were fixed on the portrait. 
 " Would you have liked best to have your 
 sister come to you when you were ill ? " she 
 asked. " When you love some one better 
 than all the world, does it not give you new 
 strength to see the dear face, and to hear the 
 beloved voice ? It is true that I am not 
 physically strong, but my love is so great 
 that, if they told me Edward was dying, I 
 am sure I could bring him back to life. And 
 he loves me as dearly as I love him, weak and 
 faulty as I am. Don't you see why I must 
 go to him ? " 
 
 "You shall go to him," he said impul- 
 sively. 
 
 "Oh, thank you, my dear, kind friend. I 
 can never thank you enough." 
 
 She rose as she spoke, and there were tears 
 in her eyes as she bade him good-night. 
 
 " You are not going to walk back," he ob-
 
 162 THE COMING OF THEODOBA. 
 
 jectecl. " I heard Dr. Rey croft drive into his 
 yard just now, and I will get him to take you 
 home. Besides, you ought not to go to Camp 
 Bemis without consulting him. Remember, if 
 anything were to happen to you, it would be 
 far harder for Edward than to have you stay 
 here now. And there is another thing to be 
 thought of. The journey is by no means a 
 simple one. You will have to spend the night 
 on the way, and take a steamboat the next 
 morning. You would find it much more 
 comfortable to have Miss Davidson with you. 
 As I told her, I shall be only too glad to 
 keep the children and their nurse with me, 
 if" 
 
 "No, I should not feel safe to leave the 
 children with any one but Theodora," she 
 interrupted hastily. " Mr. Compton," she 
 added with a sudden impulse, "you have 
 always been a good friend to Edward and 
 me, and you asked just now what you could 
 do for me. There is one thing that you can 
 do. You can come with me to Edward." 
 
 The idea of the solitary journey into the 
 wilderness had all along been terrifying to 
 poor Marie. " Mr. Compton," and again she
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 163 
 
 looked at him beseechingly with her wonder- 
 ful eyes, " if you were with me, I should fear 
 nothing. It is a great deal to ask, I know, 
 but you are so good ; you love to sacrifice 
 yourself for your friends." 
 
 " It would be no sacrifice. There is nothing 
 in the world that I should like to do so well, 
 if it can be arranged ; but I don't see how I 
 could leave Essie." 
 
 " Theodora can take care of her. She can 
 stay with my children while you are gone." 
 
 The color came back into Marie's cheeks, 
 and a smile played about her mouth. The 
 idea of a whole week, perhaps a fortnight, 
 with her husband without Theodora was in- 
 toxicating to her. Her fears concerning his 
 condition were subsiding, and the future looked 
 brighter to her than it had for months. 
 
 " I know that I shall get well in that glo- 
 rious air," she said. " Don't you see how 
 much better I look already ? Go and get Dr. 
 Reycroft, please, and tell him how much better 
 I look already." 
 
 The doctor was most satisfactory when he 
 came. He agreed that it would be a greater 
 strain on Mrs. Davidson's nerves to stay at
 
 164 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 home, worrying over her husband's condition, 
 than to go to him. He thought, if Mr. Comp- 
 ton could travel with her, there would be little 
 danger of her getting over-tired, and suggested 
 that they could send for an experienced nurse 
 if they found one was needed. He was so 
 cheery all the way home, and made so light of 
 the accident, that Marie grew less and less 
 anxious. 
 
 The light was still burning in Theodora's 
 room when the doctor left Mrs. Davidson at 
 her gate. She walked on tiptoe along the 
 path and turned the key softly in the lock, 
 feeling like a burglar. She stole softly up 
 the stairs, but as she opened the door of her 
 room, Theodora's quick ears caught the sound. 
 
 " Is that you, Marie ? " she asked. " Can I 
 get anything for you ? I hoped that you had 
 gone to sleep long ago." 
 
 " I have everything I want, thank you ; and 
 I shall go to sleep very soon." 
 
 In the morning, when they met at breakfast, 
 it was Theodora who was pale and troubled, 
 and who showed the marks of having passed 
 a sleepless night, while Marie looked less 
 fagged than she had for many days. As she
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 165 
 
 had now made up her mind that Edward's 
 illness was to be a brief one, Theodora's grave 
 face was as irritating to her as her calmness 
 had been on the previous evening. Her heart 
 smote her, however, when she saw her putting 
 the house into exquisite order, and mending 
 the children's clothes, that she might leave no 
 extra work to be done after her departure. 
 
 Marie tried once or twice to tell Theodora 
 of her determination, but her natural timid- 
 ity, joined to the certainty that she would do 
 more harm than good to her cause by speak- 
 ing, kept her silent. She felt sure that it 
 would be wiser to leave Mr. Compton to break 
 the news to her, when he called in the after- 
 noon, as he had promised to do. Occasionally, 
 the frightful possibility crossed her mind that 
 she and Frank Compton together, backed by 
 the doctor's authority, would not have suffi- 
 cient determination to make Theodora change 
 her plans. Whenever Marie thought of stay- 
 ing in Edgecomb, her husband's condition at 
 once seemed critical ; he might die if she did 
 not go to him. 
 
 Marie was driven to church, while Theodora 
 stayed at home to continue her preparations.
 
 166 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 She could not understand her sister-in-law's 
 volatile nature. On the previous evening she 
 had been on the verge of hysterics, and now 
 she seemed to have dismissed her fears, and 
 to be cheerful to the verge of light-heartedness. 
 Could she feel deeply? Did 'she know the 
 meaning of the words ? 
 
 Mr. Compton lingered after church, as 
 usual, to exchange greetings with his parish- 
 ioners, and finally walked down the aisle to 
 speak to Mrs. Davidson. She stood just out- 
 side her pew, listening, in her usual absorbed 
 way, to the woes of Mrs. Fraley, the paralytic 
 with the withered hand. The forlorn, shabby 
 old creature, in her rusty, patched gown, with 
 her wrinkled face and shaking head, made a 
 sharp contrast to the beautiful young woman 
 in her dainty pale-green gown and broad- 
 brimmed leghorn hat, trimmed with pink 
 roses, and tilted back to show the fluffy 
 golden curls on her forehead. Mr. Compton 
 made a few kindly inquiries of Mrs. Fraley, 
 and then turned to Mrs. Davidson. 
 
 " Does your sister agree to your plans ? " he 
 asked. 
 
 " I have n't told her yet ; I am waiting for
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 167 
 
 you. I feel like a wicked conspirator. Do 
 you, too, feel like a wicked conspirator?" 
 
 " I am sure she would prefer to have you 
 tell her." 
 
 Marie shook her head. " She has only a 
 poor opinion of my capacity or my strength. 
 She would insist upon my staying at home. 
 Now don't you think I look quite strong to- 
 day ? Don't you think Edward will be glad 
 to have me with him? Do you see anything 
 very much amiss in my looks? " 
 
 " I think you look very beautiful." 
 
 She colored like a girl. " It gives me great 
 pleasure to have pretty speeches made to me, 
 although I am really quite old, almost an old 
 woman, twenty-eight in fact ; and yet, when 
 Edward and I were at your sister's this sum- 
 mer, somebody thought we were on our wed- 
 ding journey. Fancy ! " 
 
 "Mrs. Davidson, I have not seen you in 
 such good spirits for months." 
 
 " It is because I am going to see Ned so 
 soon. Mr. Comptou, you won't desert me? 
 No matter what sensible things Theodora may 
 say about her being an excellent nurse and 
 having the strength of five Samsons, you will
 
 168 THE COMING OF THEODOBA 
 
 take my part ? She is so determined, and I 
 am afraid my having kept it from her so long 
 will make her angry " 
 
 " To tell you the truth, Mrs. Davidson " 
 
 " Don't tell me the truth ; the truth is such 
 a very ugly thing ! it is often as ugly as that 
 palsied old woman. All the disagreeable peo- 
 ple I know tell the truth. Edward never tells 
 it, and I never tell it, and we are agreeable 
 I mean that we never tell the whole truth. 
 Don't look so shocked ; I don't mean that we 
 are liars." 
 
 He laughed. " All the same, I advise you 
 strongly to go straight home and tell Miss Da- 
 vidson your plans, for she will have the right 
 to be very angry with both of us if you do 
 not ; and when I come this afternoon we will 
 make our final arrangements." 
 
 Marie was in the parlor when Mr. Compton 
 arrived after dinner. 
 
 " I will let Theodora know that you are 
 here," she said, as she rose to greet him. " I 
 am very weak, but I am sure you will forgive 
 me, for you are so good; I I haven't had 
 the courage to tell her." 
 
 "But, Mrs. Davidson, what will she think 
 of us?"
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 169 
 
 " I will call her now, and we will tell her 
 together ; or rather I will tell her, and you 
 can support me." 
 
 Theodora was packing. She had taken off 
 her gown and put on her bedroom wrapper, 
 and, to Marie's consternation, she refused to 
 see their visitor. 
 
 " It would take me too long to dress," she 
 stated. " Tell Mr. Compton how busy I am, 
 and I am sure he will excuse me." 
 
 This was a possibility which Marie had not 
 contemplated. It filled her with consterna- 
 tion. " My dear, that would be so impolite," 
 she said. " You must see him, for he has come 
 on especial business." 
 
 " I am very sorry, but I really can't take 
 the time for it." 
 
 " Please come down, Theodora ; he will be 
 so disappointed." 
 
 " Disappointed ? Oh, no ; if he sees you, 
 that will be all he wants." 
 
 " You quite refuse to see him ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I am sorry, but, as I said before, I 
 can't possibly spare the time." 
 
 The color came and went in Marie's face, 
 and she nervously put both hands for support
 
 170 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 on the back of an old-fashioned armchair, 
 looking furtively behind her at the open door, 
 like a prisoner who wishes to be sure that the 
 way of escape is plain. 
 
 " Theodora," she began tremulously, " I 
 have decided to go to Edward to-morrow, and 
 Mr. Compton is going with me." 
 
 " And this was the ' especial business ' on 
 which he came?" flashed out Theodora. The 
 words escaped her in spite of herself. Marie 
 could see by her face that she was very angry. 
 
 " Mr. Compton agreed with me in thinking 
 that it would be much better for me to go to 
 Edward," Marie added, gaining courage. 
 
 " It was very kind of Mr. Compton to take 
 such an interest in our affairs. Does he feel 
 sure that you will have the strength to do the 
 necessary nursing ? " 
 
 " Yes, he is sure of it, and so is Dr. Rey- 
 croft." 
 
 " Oh, you have seen the doctor ? " 
 
 " Yes ; after what you said, I did n't think 
 it would be prudent to go without first con- 
 sulting him." 
 
 " Marie, you are the kind of woman who 
 can make men agree to anything you propose,
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 171 
 
 against their better judgment ; but, charming 
 as you are, your charm does not influence me. 
 Do you suppose that I would urge you to let 
 me go to Edward if you were as strong as I 
 am, or if Edward were well and it were a mere 
 question of his pleasure ? Don't you see that 
 if he has good nursing at once, it may make 
 the difference between a long illness and a 
 short one ? I should feel diffident about my 
 capacity, if I had not taken a course in nurs- 
 ing, and always had the oversight of the girls 
 who were ill at school. I would leave it to 
 any impartial jury of women to decide which 
 of us two is the better fitted to take care of 
 Edward. A jury of men, I am aware, would 
 decide in your favor." 
 
 " And if a jury of men would decide for me, 
 there must be something to be said on my side. 
 Come down, Theodora, and hear what Frank 
 Comptou has to say." 
 
 " I don't care to hear what he has to say. 
 He has n't any opinion of his own. He agrees 
 with you, when you are with him, and last night 
 he agreed with me. I can hear just what he 
 will say : ' Miss Davidson ' (how his gentle, 
 feminine voice tries me !), ' it would undoubt-
 
 172 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 edly be a good tiling if Edward could have 
 you for a nurse, and yet he may long for his 
 sweet wife. Why not both go, and let me 
 take care of the adorable children ? ' ' 
 
 Nevertheless, as she spoke, she began to 
 array herself for the interview. 
 
 The contrast between the two women was 
 even more striking than usual as they entered 
 the room where Mr. Compton was sitting. 
 Marie still wore her graceful green gown, and 
 her rosy face and golden hair made one think 
 of a flower drooping above its green stalk. 
 There was nothing flower-like about Theodora. 
 She was too much interested in her purpose to 
 think of feminine adornment, and had put on 
 the plain, dark dress that she was meaning to 
 wear on her journey. She had never looked 
 so well, notwithstanding, for her face was full 
 of suppressed feeling, and this softened look, 
 together with the bright color that her excite- 
 ment had given her, made her really beautiful. 
 To complete the contrast, Theodora seemed 
 unaware of her attractions, while Marie was 
 fully conscious of her own numerous advan- 
 tages. 
 
 " Mrs. Davidson tells me that you mean to
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 173 
 
 go to Camp Bemis with her to-morrow," The- 
 odora began coldly, as she took a seat at 
 the opposite side of the room from Francis 
 Compton. 
 
 She felt a contempt for him when she 
 thought of the underhanded work in which 
 he had been engaged, and his slight figure and 
 fair, boyish face added to her irritation. This 
 thing was called a man, this pretty, feminine, 
 amiable thing, that she could easily overthrow 
 if it came to a question of physical strength, 
 and that she could still more easily disarm on 
 moral grounds. With two such weak antago- 
 nists, she must surely conquer. She was so 
 truly anxious to do the best for all concerned 
 that she felt no hesitation in pressing her 
 point. She went over in detail, for the benefit 
 of Mr. Compton, the many advantages to be 
 gained if she went to Edward, and when she 
 had finished her recapitulation, she turned to 
 him and asked, " Do you not think that I am 
 right?" 
 
 "No, Miss Davidson," he said in his gentle 
 voice, with a touch of apology in his manner, 
 " I think you are wrong." 
 
 " Wrong ! You think me wrong ? When
 
 174 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 I am so strong, and she is so delicate ? You 
 forget that she has her children to think of, 
 as well as her husband, and that she is unac- 
 customed to the strain of nursing, while I am 
 used to it. You think me wrong, when the 
 long journey is a terror to her and a joy to 
 me ? when everything seems easy to me, 
 and most difficult to her ? When you think 
 of all this, do you still say that I am wrong ? " 
 
 " Yes," he said slowly, " I still say that you 
 are wrong." 
 
 " And why do you think me wrong ? " 
 
 " Because her desire to be with her hus- 
 band will give her strength, whereas the anx- 
 iety might make her ill if she stayed be- 
 hind ; because all the hardships will be turned 
 to joys, since she is doing it for him ; and 
 forgive me, Miss Davidson, I shall have to 
 speak plainly : we once promised to tell the 
 whole truth to each other because I think 
 that Edward would rather have her with 
 him." 
 
 Her face changed. " That is true," she 
 said in a low voice ; " it is quite true." 
 
 Theodora's eyes followed Marie, who si- 
 lently left the room at this point.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 175 
 
 " Forgive me for being so brutal," Mr. 
 Compton begged. 
 
 " You only said what I have known for a 
 long time was true," Theodora returned. She 
 looked absently out of the window at the 
 fragrant syringa blossoms and the yellow 
 butterflies darting hither and yon like bits of 
 sunshine. "It is a strange world," she ob- 
 served " everything is so uneven. Yet although 
 butterflies are loved the best," she added pres- 
 ently, " it does not prove that they will be as 
 useful in the sick-room. If I were not so sure 
 of my own power, I should let Marie have her 
 way ; but it seems as if my training as nurse, 
 my strong constitution, and my intense long- 
 ing to help Edward were so many sign-posts 
 pointing to the fact that it is right for me to 
 go to him." 
 
 " Your sister, on her side, would say that 
 her love for her husband, and her intense 
 longing to be with him, as well as his strong 
 desire to see her, were so many sign-posts 
 pointing to the fact that it is right for her 
 to go to him. Miss Davidson, has it never 
 occurred to you that perhaps the best way 
 of helping Edward is to sacrifice your own
 
 176 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 wishes ? Have you never thought that it was 
 wrong, even for you, with the best intentions, 
 and the greatest love for both of them, to put 
 yourself between husband and wife ? Have you 
 never thought that, because you are stronger 
 than Marie, it is for you to yield ? You are 
 magnanimous. Are you not magnanimous 
 enough to stay behind to do the hard drudg- 
 ery and let her go ? " 
 
 She had been sitting all the time by the 
 open window, but now she rose and crossed 
 the room to where Francis Compton stood. 
 
 " You do not understand either her or me," 
 she said, " but you are right in advising me 
 to stay here. She shall go."
 
 XIII. 
 
 THEODORA never did anything by halves, 
 and, having once made up her mind that Marie 
 was to join her husband, she put all her en- 
 ergy into smoothing the path for her depart- 
 ure. Even Marie could find nothing that a 
 reasonable woman could object to in her sis- 
 ter-in-law's conduct, but she realized that she 
 had ceased to be a reasonable woman, so far as 
 Theodora was concerned, for the very excess 
 of her strength and efficiency exasperated her. 
 
 The next morning, Frank Compton came at 
 an early hour to leave his little girl under 
 Miss Davidson's charge, and to take Mrs. 
 Davidson to the station. She looked very 
 happy and pretty as she turned to bid Theo- 
 dora good-by. 
 
 " I shall write every day, dear, and so must 
 you," she said. " Don't let Gladys go out in 
 the sun without her hat ; and poor Guy needs 
 some new shoes sadly ; and, if you don't mind 
 sterilizing the milk yourself for baby, I shall
 
 178 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 feel safer about him ; and there is something 
 else : I promised to send some flowers to old 
 Mrs. Fraley. I know that you will remember 
 all these things, and a hundred more, for you 
 are so good." Her heart had already begun 
 to soften toward the unhappy being who was 
 to stay at home, instead of having the bliss of 
 Edward's society. 
 
 " Good-by, Marie. Give my love to Ed- 
 ward. I will do the best I can for the chil- 
 dren," said Theodora. 
 
 She watched the carriage drive off, and then 
 went into the house with bitterness in her 
 heart. The way was always smoothed for 
 women like Marie ! but if she had been the 
 one to go, would any friendly hand have been 
 stretched out to speed her on her journey? 
 Life had never seemed so unutterably flat, 
 stale, and unprofitable. Instead of having 
 the happiness of nursing her brother, joined to 
 the excitement of being in new, wild places, 
 she had to stay at home to see that four chil- 
 dren did not go beyond the bounds of reason 
 in their mischief, and to sterilize the milk for a 
 fretful baby, who did not even have the name 
 of Nathaniel Bradlee to recommend him !
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 179 
 
 The temporary legacy which Francis Comp- 
 ton had left behind him did not serve to make 
 her life any easier. She felt sure that another 
 such naughty, willful little girl as Essie Comp- 
 ton did not exist. Essie, in fact, having an 
 equally unflattering opinion of her hostess, 
 gave vent to her various impulses, and led the 
 other children into numerous forms of mis- 
 chief. She was a bright little thing, the kind 
 of child who is supposed by her fond relatives 
 to show marks of genius, but is regarded by 
 the cold world beyond the domestic circle 
 with scant favor. One virtue she had, how- 
 ever : she always told the truth ; and as Gladys 
 had lax views with regard to veracity, poor 
 Essie had more than her share of punish- 
 ment, for Dora, although an honest child, 
 could not protect her friend without betraying 
 her sister. One of their escapades was to re- 
 gale themselves freely upon green currants. 
 They all suffered the reward of the evil-doer, 
 but the consequences to Essie, who was a deli- 
 cate child, were so disastrous that Theodora 
 doubted whether she ought to let her go to a 
 children's party, with Dora and Gladys, given 
 by Mrs. Shimmin.
 
 180 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " I am afraid that you ought to stay at 
 home, Essie," she said, as she tied Gladys's 
 blue sash. "You will be sure to eat some- 
 thing that will make you ill again." 
 
 Essie's face assumed a woebegone expression 
 that changed to a sullen look of defiance. " I 
 hate, hate, hate her ! " she said to herself. 
 
 " You see, if you had not been a naughty 
 girl, Estelle, then you would not have been 
 ill," Theodora continued. 
 
 " But Gladys and I were naughty girls, too, 
 Aunt Theodora," Dora suggested, "and yet 
 we are going to the party. Please let her go ; 
 she will promise to be a good girl, and not 
 eat anything that will hurt her. We will all 
 promise." 
 
 " Will you promise not to eat any fruit 
 or cake? I want Gladys to promise that, 
 too." 
 
 " Can she go if we won't eat any fruit or 
 cake ? " asked Gladys. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Oh, goody ! goody ! goody ! We '11 prom- 
 ise. And you can wear your white dress and 
 red sash, Essie. Promise, quick ! for there 
 is n't much time."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 181 
 
 Essie promised, half defiantly, and the three 
 little girls set off in due season for Mrs. Shim- 
 min's charming house with the entrancing 
 garden. 
 
 When they returned at night, there was 
 a suspicious pallor on Essie's cheeks, and a 
 drawn look to her mouth. 
 
 " Estelle," Theodora asked, " did you break 
 your promise ? Did you eat any fruit or 
 cake?" 
 
 " I did not eat any fruit." 
 
 " Did you eat any cake ? " 
 
 Gladys, unobserved by her aunt, was mak- 
 ing negative signs from the corner of the 
 room. 
 
 " Well," said Essie deliberately, " I didn't 
 eat any cake exactly, but I did eat some 
 Washington pie." 
 
 "Estelle, I trusted you entirely. Do you 
 think it was being a good girl to get around 
 your promise in that underhanded way ? 
 Your father is a very truthful man, and I am 
 sure that it would grieve him to know that his 
 little girl had been so naughty. You knew 
 that Washington pie was the same as cake ? " 
 
 " Yes 'm," she said doggedly.
 
 182 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 " And you promised me that you would n't 
 eat any cake ? " 
 
 " Yes W 
 
 " Then why did you eat it ? " 
 
 Poor Essie might have replied in the lan- 
 guage of Scripture, " The woman tempted me, 
 and I did eat," for this evasion of the spirit 
 of her promise had been suggested by Gladys, 
 but she was too loyal to her friend. 
 
 " Why do you do things that you ought not 
 to ? " she retorted. 
 
 " Estelle, you must not speak to me in that 
 way. It is very impertinent. I am sorry 
 that you were a naughty girl, and I shall send 
 you to bed half an hour earlier than usual." 
 
 As the child was too tired to sit up any 
 longer, this did not seem an overwhelming 
 punishment, to Theodora, but suitability in 
 punishment is not often considered by chil- 
 dren. 
 
 " Elizabeth will put you to bed now," Theo- 
 dora proceeded. 
 
 As Essie lay in the deepening twilight, try- 
 ing to stay awake all night, " just to spite that 
 hateful, horrid Miss Davidson," the world 
 seemed a most unjust place. Gladys was the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 183 
 
 worst culprit, for she had eaten twice as much 
 "Washington pie, and with no ill effects. She 
 was sitting up half an hour longer, listening 
 to " Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," and 
 Miss Davidson would never find out that she 
 had eaten any Washington pie. If she were 
 asked whether she had eaten any cake, she 
 would say " No," and her aunt would believe 
 her. And yet, strange to say, her childish 
 indignation was not centred upon Gladys, fas- 
 cinating, darling Gladys, whom everybody 
 loved, but upon the undiscerning, unjust Miss 
 Davidson, and the inequality of things in gen- 
 eral. As she tossed about in her little bed, 
 she was struggling with the same problems 
 that had suggested themselves to the older 
 woman, and she, too, cried in the bitterness of 
 her heart, "It is an unfair world." 
 
 After Gladys had been put to bed, she stole 
 into the next room to comfort her friend. 
 
 " How do you feel now ? " she asked, 
 smoothing her pillow as tenderly as her 
 mother might have done. 
 
 "My body feels well enough," said Essie 
 sententiously, " but my mind feels strange." 
 
 " You don't think you are going to have
 
 184 THE COMING OF THEODOBA. 
 
 a fever, do you ? " asked the anxious little 
 nurse. 
 
 " I guess not ; I never heard of Washing- 
 ton pie giving anybody a fever." 
 
 " Why did you tell her that you had eaten 
 any Washington pie? She asked you if you 
 had eaten any cake, and I kept making a sign 
 to you to say ' No.' " 
 
 " It was cake." 
 
 " It was n't cake ; it was pie. She did n't 
 say not to eat any pie. Dora wanted me 
 to tell her that I had had pie, too. But it 
 would n't have made you feel any better to 
 have had me go to bed early and lose ' Alice 
 in Wonderland,' would it ? " she asked caress- 
 ingly. 
 
 " I think it would have made me feel better 
 in my mind." 
 
 " Essie, darling, I will let you play with 
 Muriel all to-morrow, and she is my very 
 sweetest doll. Will that make you feel better 
 in your mind ? " 
 
 " It does n't seem the same thing, somehow, 
 as telling the truth," objected Essie, " but I 
 should like to play with Muriel." 
 
 " Essie, you love me just as well as you do
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 185 
 Dora, even if I did n't tell about the pie, don't 
 
 you?" 
 
 " I can't help loving you better than Dora, 
 no matter what you do," confessed poor Essie. 
 
 "Good-night, then, and we won't say any- 
 thing more about the pie." 
 
 "No, we will never speak about it again," 
 said Essie ; and yet her sense of justice was 
 not satisfied. 
 
 The next morning, a letter came to Essie 
 from her father, saying that he should have to 
 be gone another week, and this news nearly 
 broke her heart. Even Muriel afforded but 
 slight comfort. Essie was not well enough to 
 play out-of-doors with the other children, and 
 Theodora was too full of her own anxieties to 
 do more than provide her with a paint-box 
 and some pictures. The poor little thing was 
 terribly homesick, and read her letter over 
 and over until she knew it by heart. 
 
 " I am sorry not to be with niy little girl," 
 her father wrote, " but her poor Uncle Ned, 
 whom she loves so much, is very ill, and so I 
 must stay here a week longer, and all the 
 people at church must have somebody else 
 preach to them, and my little girl must have
 
 186 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 somebody else preach to her. She must be 
 brave, and not cry at all, and she must be a 
 good girl, and not trouble kind Miss David- 
 son, who is taking such excellent care of her." 
 " Excellent care ! " At this point her tears 
 began to flow. She struggled to keep them 
 back, because her father had told her not to 
 cry, but she thought how little he knew the 
 real state of the case. How she longed for 
 him ! He had never been away from her for 
 so many days before, and she loved him more 
 than she loved any one in the whole world, 
 even better than she loved Gladys; and she 
 hated Miss Davidson more than she hated 
 any one in the whole world, even more than 
 she hated the cook who drank, or the maid 
 who stole. Indeed, Marianne had always been 
 very nice, and she had loved her dearly until 
 she found what a bad, bad girl she was. She 
 hated Miss Davidson more than she hated the 
 others, for the reason that she was so strict 
 and decided, and because she sometimes called 
 her Estelle, which was not right, as it was her 
 mother's name ; and because she had sent her 
 to bed half an hour too early, just because she 
 had not told a lie ; and she should think that
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 187 
 
 George Washington would feel very sorry up 
 in heaven when he heard that a little girl was 
 punished on account of having told the truth 
 about one of his pies. Miss Davidson was an 
 unkind, hateful woman, and she would not do 
 a thing to please her, not even for her papa's 
 sake. 
 
 Poor Theodora, who was nearly beside her- 
 self with anxiety concerning Edward, was too 
 preoccupied to give much thought to the pale- 
 faced little girl, who bent over her painting in 
 a silence that the older woman did not recog- 
 nize as hostile. A letter had come for her, 
 also, by the morning mail, in which Mr. 
 Compton stated that the inflammation was 
 spreading on Edward's hand, and that they 
 feared an operation would be necessary. Con- 
 sequently the whole ghastly range of possibil- 
 ities, with which her medical knowledge made 
 her only too familiar, was in her mind all day. 
 
 The week that followed was inexpressibly 
 dreary. For four days Theodora heard no 
 news ; then she received a few penciled lines 
 from Marie, saying Edward was doing well, 
 and that Mr. Compton would tell her every- 
 thing when he returned on Saturday. " Dear
 
 188 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Theodora," the letter ended, " I can never be 
 sufficiently grateful to you for letting me 
 be with my husband during all this time of 
 anxiety." 
 
 What did these words mean ? Marie should 
 have said less or more. What were they 
 keeping from her ? Did no one remember that 
 she, too, would have given her heart's blood 
 to be with Edward, and that she, too, was 
 consumed with anxiety? Could Marie never 
 learn that a sister may love with the same in- 
 tense devotion as a wife ? Theodora longed 
 and yet dreaded to have Saturday come. One 
 moment she felt that she would give anything 
 to have her suspense ended, and the next she 
 wished that she could postpone indefinitely the 
 certainty that might be so much worse than 
 suspense.
 
 XIV. 
 
 IT was late in the afternoon of Saturday 
 when Mr. Compton finally appeared. Theo- 
 dora ran eagerly to the door to let him in. 
 
 " What is the news ? " she demanded breath- 
 lessly. Then a glance at his face told her that 
 there was no good news. 
 
 " Is he worse ? Is he " She could not 
 finish the sentence. 
 
 " He is doing as well as he can under the 
 circumstances, Miss Davidson." 
 
 " Something has happened. Do not keep 
 me in suspense ! " she entreated. 
 
 He followed her into the parlor, where she 
 took her accustomed seat by the window, and 
 motioned to him to take a chair a little distance 
 away from her. There was a pause. 
 
 " I know what it is," she said unsteadily. 
 " There has had to be an operation, and " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Oh ! " she cried, with a little shudder, 
 " poor boy ! "
 
 190 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " He was very brave." 
 
 "Yes," and she raised her head proudly, 
 " the Davidsons are not cowards." 
 
 " Miss Davidson, I wish that I did not have 
 to tell you this thing ; I thought Marie was 
 going to write it to you, but she said she 
 could not. It was worse than we feared." 
 
 " You don't mean " 
 
 " I mean that in order to save his life " 
 
 " Don't tell me," she said, putting up her 
 hand imperiously. Then, as she let it drop 
 again, she looked at it for a moment absently 
 and added, " And it was his right hand ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Do you mean to tell me that he has had 
 to lose his right hand ? " she asked hoarsely. 
 
 He was silent. " Miss Davidson," he added 
 presently, " he was very brave." 
 
 "You have told me that before. I oh, 
 I beg your pardon for speaking like that, it 
 was so good of you to be with him ! but 
 I think it will break my heart." 
 
 As she spoke, she buried her face in her 
 hands and burst into a passion of tears. 
 Frank Compton felt as helpless as if a strong 
 man had given way to grief.- She was too un-
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 191 
 
 conscious to think of putting a restraint upon 
 herself on account of his presence. It would 
 have been the same if the room had been full 
 of people. Her tears seemed like a sudden 
 storm, unexpected, terrible, inevitable. 
 
 " Don't go," she begged, as he rose to leave 
 the room. There was something in his pres- 
 ence that comforted her. He, too, loved Ed- 
 ward. When she grew a little calmer, she 
 asked him many questions concerning the last 
 fortnight, and by the time his narration was 
 over she had wholly regained her self-control. 
 
 " I can hardly, even yet, believe that it is 
 true," she said at last. " He has always been 
 so strong and so handsome, and he has had 
 almost a contempt for the unfortunate people 
 in the world. I mean the unconscious half 
 pity, half aversion of a nature that, physically 
 speaking, is beyond reproach. He would do 
 anything for them, he is always kind ; but they 
 have annoyed him, the army of the halt and 
 the maimed, and he has had a shrinking from 
 them, and now " her voice sank " he will 
 be one of them ! How will he bear it ? " 
 
 " He will bear it like a brave man. He 
 will not be made morbid by it, and so and
 
 192 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 because he is so charming no one will give 
 it a second thought ; but it is a terrible loss." 
 
 " If I had only gone to him, perhaps I could 
 have prevented it," she moaned. 
 
 " I don't think it would have made any dif- 
 ference, and you certainly have nothing with 
 which to reproach yourself. The whole affair 
 was taken out of your hands." 
 
 " To lose one's right hand," she continued ; 
 " never to paint again ; always to be helpless, 
 even in the smaller concerns of life ; to be 
 maimed, crippled; and for it to have come to 
 him of all people, to my superbly strong, tal- 
 ented brother ! When I think of the bright 
 and hopeful boy that he was, of all his plans 
 for the future, of the great pictures that he 
 was going to paint" She left her sen- 
 tence unfinished, and struggled with her tears. 
 
 "Miss Davidson, I would have given my 
 own right hand if it could have saved his." 
 
 " Would you ? " she asked, glancing up ea- 
 gerly, as if in some way the exchange might 
 be effected. " I like you for saying it. How 
 willingly would I give mine for his ! " and she 
 looked down at her own well- shaped right 
 hand. " A woman's hand ! Of what account
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 193 
 
 is a woman's hand in the world, when com- 
 pared with the hand of a strong man, of a 
 man with a touch of genius who might have 
 done some glorious thing! " 
 
 " I sometimes think " he began hesitat- 
 ingly- 
 
 She cut him short. " Don't say it, please. 
 I have sometimes thought so too ; but to put 
 a thing into actual words seems to make it 
 more true, and I like to think now that he 
 might have done, might have been anything." 
 
 " And so he might." 
 
 " I am glad you have not told me, as Mr. 
 Thorndyke would have done, that I ought to 
 be thankful things are not any worse. He 
 would say that I should be humbly grateful 
 that Edward's life is spared. I hate all the 
 trite, consolatory, ministerial remarks. Do 
 you believe that everything works together 
 for good ? " 
 
 " There is another clause to the text : * All 
 things work together for good to them that 
 love God.' I think we often fail to get all 
 the good we might out of our trials." 
 
 " You are begging the question. I, for my 
 part, do not believe that a thing like this is
 
 194 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 sent by God as a means of discipline. I think 
 it happens by accident, and that He is no 
 more responsible for it than I am." 
 
 " Call it accident, or call it God's plan, and 
 the fact remains that the thing has happened, 
 and that the misfortune can be borne in such 
 a way that it will do positive harm to the per- 
 son himself and to all about him, or it can be 
 borne well. Have you never found that you 
 have got unexpected good from your own 
 trials?" 
 
 " Never ! I have got nothing but harm 
 from them. I should be a much sweeter 
 person if my girlhood had not been embit- 
 tered by my father's marriage." 
 
 " That is quite possible," he said absently. 
 
 Theodora resented these words. It is pleas- 
 anter to be told the truth, the whole truth, 
 and nothing but the truth, in theory than in 
 practice, and, truth-loving as she was, she was 
 but human. 
 
 " You would not be as strong a woman as 
 you are now if you had not suffered," he 
 added gently. 
 
 " I hate strong women ! " she exclaimed 
 vehemently. " How could I have got any
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 195 
 
 good from my own trials?" she added irrele- 
 vantly. 
 
 " Miss Davidson, I am sure you don't want 
 me to make any ' trite ministerial remarks ' ? " 
 
 " I suppose you mean that our trials ought 
 to make us more sympathetic ? " 
 
 " I don't like to preach any better than 
 you like to be preached to. I was only think- 
 ing that in my own case I have found a cer- 
 tain unexpected comfort in having sounded 
 the depths of sorrow. It has made it easier 
 to understand the point of view of those who 
 have suffered." 
 
 " Yet you would be happy again, if you 
 could ? You would undo the past, if you 
 could, and make it different ? " 
 
 She was surprised at the effect of her words. 
 "Don't ask me that question," he said with 
 agitation ; " we can't choose : that ought to be 
 enough for us." 
 
 They were interrupted by Essie at this 
 point, who rushed into the room and flung 
 her arms around her father's neck. " You 
 dear papa ! " she cried, as she kissed him over 
 and over again, "you dear, dear, darling papa! 
 How I have missed you ! And you must
 
 196 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 never, never go away without me again ; and 
 I have had a perfectly horrid time, and I 
 never want to come here " 
 
 " Hush ! my dear child, you must n't say 
 that ! I am afraid you have been so naughty 
 that Miss Davidson will never want you here 
 again. We must go home now. Shake hands 
 with her Essie, and thank her for having been 
 so kind to you." 
 
 " Don't make her say that ; that is a matter 
 of opinion," said Theodora, as she touched the 
 tips of Essie's fingers. 
 
 She watched the two go down the walk to- 
 gether, and wondered how it would seem to 
 be loved by any human being as Estelle loved 
 her father. 
 
 The night which followed was terrible to 
 Theodora. She could not get away from the 
 vision of the bright boy, as he had been in 
 past years, who now in the prime of life was 
 crippled and helpless. She had a blind feel- 
 ing of rebellion against a resistless, remorse- 
 less fate, by the side of which she, strong of 
 will and strong of purpose, was as thistledown 
 in the wind. She, Theodora Davidson, who 
 would have given her life for her brother, was 
 utterly powerless to help him.
 
 . THE COMING OF THEODORA. 197 
 
 Day came at last, another day, heralded by 
 a golden sunrise, and the twittering of birds, 
 and all the delicious minor sounds that go to 
 the making of a July morning ; but Theodora 
 was blind and deaf to the outside world, and 
 could only repeat to herself, " All thy waves 
 and thy billows have gone over me," and she 
 knew, as she had never known before, the 
 meaning of the words, " The valley of the 
 shadow of death." 
 
 Later in the day, the Sunday bells rang out 
 clear and sweet, and the usual sedate stream 
 of church-goers passed the house in their 
 sober Sunday array. Theodora followed them 
 at a distance, for she had a sudden impulse to 
 hear Francis Compton preach. She did not 
 sit in the Davidson pew, which was in the 
 centre of the church, where she would be seen 
 and questioned, but she took her seat close by 
 the door, in the free pew that was reserved for 
 the poor in the parish. An old woman who 
 was nearly blind, and Mrs. Fraley with her 
 withered hand, were the other occupants. She 
 shuddered when she remembered that into this 
 world of suffering her brother had entered 
 now, and she felt herself a part of it through
 
 198 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 the intensity of her sympathy for him. There 
 was little of the spiritual in her nature, but 
 to-day her heart cried out for strength and 
 comfort, and as she heard the opening reading 
 she had a strange, new feeling of fellowship 
 with all the stricken souls who had heard the 
 same words from generation to generation, 
 and sought like herself to find comfort and 
 strength somewhere. " Why art thou cast 
 down, O my soul," Mr. Compton read, 
 " and why art thou disquieted in me ? hope 
 thou in God : for I shall yet praise him for the 
 help of his countenance." 
 
 She was not in the habit of listening atten- 
 tively to a church service, but she caught 
 stray sentences, and she liked to be there. 
 When it came to the sermon, there was some- 
 thing in its directness and simplicity that went 
 straight to her heart, and made her forget to 
 criticise it, as usual, from an intellectual stand- 
 point. The young minister was, for the time 
 being, an apostle with a message for all the 
 sorrowing, and a half-forgotten text came into 
 her mind, fraught with a new meaning, "A 
 man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." 
 
 She hurried home as soon as church was
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 199 
 
 over, that she might not have to speak to any 
 one ; and, as she pursued her solitary way, she 
 noticed that the birds were singing, and that 
 the sun was shining in a cloudless sky. The 
 worst was over. Hers was a nature that would 
 always have a sharp, passionate struggle and 
 then submit to the inevitable, and she was al- 
 ready gathering courage to face her life as it 
 must be in the future. She would devote her- 
 self to her brother more intelligently than she 
 had ever done before, and help him, as no one 
 else could, to bear this great trial.
 
 XV. 
 
 IN the weeks that followed, Theodora looked 
 forward eagerly to Frank Compton's daily 
 visit, for he always brought the latest news 
 from Edward, and Edward was a strong bond 
 between them. Their intercourse was now on 
 a thoroughly satisfactory footing. When a 
 man has told a woman that he does not love 
 her, and has been refused by her because she 
 does not love him, there is a straightforward 
 simplicity in their relations that is not without 
 charm. There need be no self-consciousness 
 on either side. If to love him would be im- 
 possible, it was quite possible to like him, and 
 to feel that she had not done justice formerly 
 to the quiet strength that lay concealed be- 
 neath a misleading manner. 
 
 Theodora's anxieties were increased by the 
 baby, who took this inconsiderate time to have 
 an ill turn. It proved to be nothing serious, 
 but the hours that she spent with the little 
 Cyril were the means of giving him a place in
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 201 
 
 her heart second only to that occupied by his 
 father, and she even grew to love the sound of 
 his objectionable name. One afternoon, when 
 the baby was better, but very restless and 
 fretful, Mr. Compton came in just as she was 
 trying to hush him to sleep. He entered un- 
 announced, as the front door was open, and 
 saw her bending over the unhappy baby, who 
 was doubling up his little fist and dealing 
 reckless blows in blind rage at his aunt. 
 
 " Come, now, little man, you must behave 
 yourself," she said. " You must go to sleep." 
 
 It might be easy for Theodora to force older 
 people to obey her, but she was wholly routed 
 by a five-months-old baby. He evidently had 
 no idea of behaving himself. She looked so 
 unusually attractive as she glanced down at 
 her obstreperous nephew that Frank lingered 
 a moment before making his presence known. 
 Her smooth hair had been roughened by small 
 hands, and her becoming blue gingham gown 
 had lost its usual spotless daintiness, and was 
 somewhat crumpled. These imperfections 
 served to make her seem more dear and 
 human. 
 
 " * This little pig went to market,' " she was
 
 202 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 saying, "look out, baby, you will pull my 
 hair down, ' this little pig had roast meat ' " 
 
 " No, he did n't," said Frank, " * this little 
 pig stayed at home ; ' it was the other little 
 pig who had roast beef; history has been kind 
 enough to give us realistic details. I am sur- 
 prised that such a well-informed young woman 
 should have so sadly forgotten her Mother 
 Goose." 
 
 She looked up with a smile. " Mr. Comp- 
 ton, I did n't know that you were there. Do 
 take that armchair, and please forgive this 
 very naughty young person, who has done 
 nothing but howl for the last hour." 
 
 " Give him to me ; I can make him go to 
 sleep." 
 
 "You?" 
 
 " Yes. I had a lot of practice with Essie, 
 who was a very fractious baby." 
 
 " But that was years ago. You need not 
 tell me that you can put this baby to sleep 
 more successfully than his aunt can, need he, 
 baby? For we won't believe him, will we? 
 Is n't he a fascinating little thing?" 
 
 " Very, especially when he tries to demolish 
 you."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 203 
 
 " No, but really don't you think he is re- 
 markably handsome for a small baby ? " 
 
 " Just now, with his face drawn up into a 
 knot?" 
 
 " You are most unappreciative. Cyril, you 
 need not look at him ; he is a heartless man." 
 
 " Give him to me, and I will make him a 
 very good little boy." 
 
 " I shall do no such thing." 
 
 " He is putting out his hands to me, Miss 
 Davidson. He wants to come to me." 
 
 " The unnatural little wretch ! " 
 
 It was too true. He put out his hands in 
 a most enticing and irresistible manner; and 
 when Theodora turned his face the other way, 
 he gave such a heart-rending wail that she was 
 obliged to relinquish him. Mr. Compton took 
 him, and began to walk the room with him. 
 
 " You are getting him into dreadful habits ; 
 he is not supposed to be walked with, ever." 
 
 The baby had already stopped crying, and 
 Frank threw a mischievous glance at Theo- 
 dora. " Perhaps he takes after his aunt ; per- 
 haps he can't get any good out of discipline," 
 he ventured. " Anyway, he seems to be going 
 to sleep ! "
 
 204 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " What have you done to him ? You have 
 bewitched him ; I ani desperately jealous." 
 
 " He likes me ; he thinks me very nice," he 
 observed with a tantalizing smile. " Young 
 man, you are most undiscerning. I declare, 
 he is almost off already ! " 
 
 He was wholly " off " a little later, and 
 Frank stopped before Theodora in his walk 
 and announced the fact. 
 
 " The little rascal is actually asleep. What 
 shall I do with him?" 
 
 " Give him to me." 
 
 " I will do nothing so rash. He will wake 
 up again and demand all your attention, and I 
 want it myself. You shall not have him. I 
 will dump him into his carriage, or his crib, 
 or wherever the orthodox place is." 
 
 " Very well, you may take him upstairs to 
 Elizabeth in the nursery." 
 
 When he had satisfactorily disposed of Cyril 
 and returned to the parlor, Theodora's hair was 
 in its usual state of trim perfection. 
 
 " I am sorry you did n't let the baby's rav- 
 ages stay," he said. " It seems to put you 
 more on a level with other people to have a ' rav- 
 age ' or two, and I feel less afraid of you."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 205 
 
 " I have not observed that I have succeeded 
 in inspiring you with awe precisely at any 
 tfme." 
 
 They talked about Edward at first, and then 
 of nothing in particular. Theodora could not 
 help knowing that she pleased him, and the 
 knowledge was very delightful. Her girl- 
 hood had been so sombre and hard-working 
 that there was the charm of novelty even in 
 the admiration of a man like Francis Comp- 
 ton, whom she considered more than half a 
 woman. She knew, or she thought she knew, 
 that there was no danger of his falling in love 
 with her. 
 
 Essie had gone away on a three days' visit 
 to her aunt, and therefore her father insisted 
 upon spending the rest of the afternoon with 
 Miss Davidson. In vain she suggested to him 
 that he ought to make parish calls. 
 
 " I should like to know what I am making 
 now," he replied. " I am sure you are half a 
 parishioner of mine, even if Thorndyke does 
 claim the other half." 
 
 " I am at least no parishioner of his." 
 
 " I intend to stay here all the afternoon," 
 he went on, " unless you turn me out. I used
 
 206 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 to go in for duty and that sort of thing, but 
 you once told me that I felt it of too great 
 consequence whether I made all the parish 
 calls that I ought to make, and ever since I 
 have decided to relax." 
 
 " If this is a parish call, your position is 
 illogical," she said, smiling. 
 
 "No, for you told me that, if I put my 
 heart into the parish calls, it would be no 
 effort to make them. I am doing that now ; 
 my heart is very much 'in it.' ' 
 
 " If you stay, I shall set you to work," she 
 observed with mock severity ; " the tennis- 
 court ought to be marked out again : and I 
 shall have to pick some currants for tea, for it 
 is the cook's ' afternoon out.' " 
 
 " If I help you pick the currants, may I 
 help you eat them? The children would love 
 to have me stay," he proceeded plaintively ; 
 " they like me, and the baby might wake up, 
 you know." 
 
 He stayed, to the infinite delight of the 
 children, who surrounded him in a body, as 
 soon as they discovered his presence, and 
 demanded stories. 
 
 "You tell lots nicer stories than Aunt
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 207 
 
 Theodora does," Dora observed, with the Da- 
 vidson frankness. 
 
 " I am sure Aunt Theodora tells very nice 
 ones," said Gladys politely. 
 
 " Why, you know you said yourself," ex- 
 postulated Dora, " that they were always the 
 same thing over and over ; she only knows 
 three or four." 
 
 " But they are very nice," reiterated Gla- 
 dys. " Everybody is n't a minister, and used 
 to making up stories." 
 
 " We are even now, Miss Davidson," Frank 
 laughed. 
 
 Presently they all went out into the delight- 
 ful, old-fashioned garden behind the house, 
 where the currants hung in tempting red 
 clusters, no longer fraught with disaster, and 
 the apple-trees, full of young, half-grown 
 apples, made a pleasant green bower over- 
 head. Here the children flitted from bush to, 
 bush, sharing a small pail, while Frank and 
 Theodora each filled a large one ; and Theo- 
 dora was almost as light-hearted as the chil- 
 dren, and the world seemed very bright, as 
 the mellow sunlight fell on the little group of 
 merry, upturned faces.
 
 208 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Here are some very large currants," said 
 Guy at length. " I want you to have them, 
 Aunt Theodora," and he slipped his small 
 hand over the edge of her pail to drop in the 
 juicy red cluster. The sight of that sturdy 
 little right hand brought to her mind, with a 
 sudden shock, the remembrance of her bro- 
 ther's affliction. 
 
 " Maimed, crippled," she thought, and the 
 world seemed suddenly overshadowed, while 
 she reproached herself for having completely 
 forgotten Edward's misfortune for a happy 
 half hour. She forgot it again afterwards, 
 when Mr. Compton served currants and bread- 
 and-butter and cold mutton to a hungry group, 
 while she made tea at the other end of the 
 table ; and many times, in the days that fol- 
 lowed, she had a young, irresponsible feeling 
 of happiness. 
 
 When the time was at last set for the 
 return of her brother and his wife, Theodora 
 had a vague sense of chill and disappoint- 
 ment. She was not used to self-analysis, and 
 took it for granted that it arose because she 
 could no longer forget for a moment the ter- 
 rible calamity that overshadowed her brother's
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 209 
 
 life. As the hour of his home-coming drew 
 nearer and nearer, her light-heartedness disap- 
 peared, and she was once more the serious 
 woman burdened with many cares. How 
 could she bear the first greeting ? How could 
 she hide the shrinking that any physical de- 
 formity caused her? How could she show 
 her sympathy, and yet prevent the first mo- 
 ments from being too tragic ? 
 
 When the hour for Edward's arrival actu- 
 ally came, as Theodora stood at the parlor 
 window waiting for the first sight of the re- 
 turning travelers, she grew more and more 
 nervous. At last she saw Dobbin coming into 
 view, and then she had a glimpse of Marie, 
 looking very pale and fagged, poor child, and 
 of Edward, pale too, but with a smile on his 
 lips. She had a sudden impulse to flee, but 
 she bravely stood her ground. The carriage 
 had reached the front gate now, and they were 
 getting out. Edward came along the path, 
 and ran up the steps with his old elastic 
 tread, and in another minute Theodora rushed 
 towards him with outstretched arms. 
 
 " Excuse my left hand, Theo," Edward ex- 
 claimed cheerily, as he grasped hers. "If
 
 210 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 I were only that old fellow Briareus, was 
 it ? who had so many, I could give you 
 more of a choice." 
 
 " Edward ! " Her voice was husky, the 
 tears came into her eyes, and, with a sudden 
 abandon of feeling, she threw her arms 
 around his neck and sobbed as if her heart 
 would break. 
 
 " Dear old Theo, don't mind so much. 
 I 'm not worth all this commotion," he said 
 unsteadily. Then, after a moment, he added 
 in his usual cheerful tones : " I know what is 
 troubling you, Theo, my love ; you are worry- 
 ing for fear the Life of General Nathaniel 
 Bradlee Davidson will never get written."
 
 XVI. 
 
 WITH the return of her brother, Theodora, 
 who was a woman of one idea at a. time, for- 
 got Frank Compton altogether, in her over- 
 mastering desire to be of use to Edward. 
 He was touched by her devotion, and by the 
 self-abnegation which meant so much from a 
 woman of her type ; for she entirely aban- 
 doned her old position of mentor, and her one 
 wish now was to make him happy in his own 
 way. Nathaniel Bradlee Davidson and the 
 town-meeting were alike consigned to obli- 
 vion. He had always loved Theodora, and, 
 even in the days when she exasperated him 
 the most, he had regarded her as a sister of 
 whom any man might be proud, and had 
 taken pleasure in her many mental and physi- 
 cal attractions ; but now that she had given 
 up her incorrigible desire to improve him, he 
 found in her a hundred new charms. He had 
 never suspected that she had such a tender 
 and lovable side ; and he felt a sense of exhil-
 
 212 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 aration when he succeeded in drawing out 
 from this proud and reserved -woman some 
 half -shy expression of the strength of her 
 love for him, or the depth of her tenderness. 
 None of the flirtations of his early days had 
 given him as keen enjoyment as the study of 
 his sister under these new conditions. 
 
 He was, as Frank had said, a brave man, 
 and he accepted his disability as a brave man 
 should. He had never set up for a model in 
 any respect, and his creed was a short one ; 
 but he firmly believed in not worrying other 
 people with his misfortunes, and in looking 
 persistently on the bright side. He devoutly 
 hoped that no one would ever realize how 
 much he suffered, not even Marie ; but Theo- 
 dora, who was made of the same Spartan 
 stuff, divined that his gayety was but a cloak 
 to hide his depression, and this knowledge 
 gave the final touch of tenderness to her man- 
 ner. She never spoke of his affliction, but 
 they understood each other without words. 
 Unhappiness was so overwhelmingly distaste- 
 ful to Edward, that he cast about for all 
 the alleviations to his lot that he could find, 
 and, mingled with his acute pain, there was a
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 213 
 
 half-shamefaced feeling of relief. He need 
 no longer struggle with his inertia and love of 
 ease. Fate had settled the question for him, 
 and no one would ever again expect him to 
 become an eminent artist. " Poor old David- 
 son ! he is out of the running now," the men 
 would say, and would regard him all the more 
 affectionately. To go through life as a man 
 of genius whose career has been prematurely 
 cut short by the loss of his right hand is 
 tragic ; but it is more dignified than to go 
 through it as a man of genius whose career 
 has been impeded by his indolence. So, if 
 life was hard for Edward Davidson, it was 
 not without its compensations. 
 
 At present, Theodora was the greatest of 
 these. Marie, after the strain that she had 
 gone through, had collapsed utterly. She 
 was well enough to go about all her daily avo- 
 cations, including her painting, but she was 
 in that exhausted state of the nerves when a 
 sharp word brings tears to the eyes, and the 
 mind refuses to act with its accustomed quick- 
 ness. She was too worn out and depressed to 
 be a cheerful companion for her husband, and 
 at first she welcomed Theodora's devotion with
 
 214 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 self-reproachful gratitude ; but a few days of 
 it, coupled with Edward's increasing pleasure 
 in his sister's society, was enough to arouse, in 
 fresh intensity, her sleeping jealousy. This 
 was the worst calamity that had befallen her. 
 Hitherto her husband had shared her regret 
 that Theodora was a fixture in the household, 
 but to have him enjoy his sister's society to 
 the extent of neglecting his wife was a trial 
 which she had not the fortitude to bear. It 
 takes not only a generous woman to rejoice 
 in her husband's absorption in another, even 
 if the other is his sister, but a woman who 
 is mentally and physically strong; for when 
 the head is tired, and the body racked with 
 pain, it is impossible to take a healthy view 
 of things. Marie no longer had the outlet 
 of her husband's sympathy, but kept her feel- 
 ings to herself, where they smouldered in 
 unnatural repression. " Oh, she is good, so 
 good, and she loves Edward so ! " she cried. 
 " What am I that I should hate her very 
 goodness ? " 
 
 Meanwhile her husband and his sister went 
 their way with a serene unconsciousness of 
 her feelings that added the final, poignant
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 215 
 
 drop to her cup of bitterness. Theodora was 
 ready to walk with Edward when Marie was 
 too tired to drag herself out of the house, or 
 to drive or row with him when Marie was 
 sketching. She played chess with him by the 
 hour together, a game in which his wife was 
 not proficient ; and she let him read aloud to 
 her all the articles in which her sister-in-law 
 had no interest. Even at meal-times Marie 
 had cause for jealousy, for Theodora had 
 taken Edward's place at the foot of the table, 
 and was his right hand. Poor Marie, down 
 among the teacups, with Guy on one side of 
 her and Gladys on the other, had to see Theo- 
 dora doing all those little services for Edward 
 that she was longing to do herself. She was 
 too generous to show by word or deed that she 
 was disturbed by their growing intimacy, and 
 even went so far as to urge them to go to 
 walk or to row together ; but when they took 
 her words at their face value, she felt annoyed 
 by their lack of discernment, and hurt by their 
 readiness to dispense with her society. 
 
 It never occurred to Theodora that her 
 sister-in-law would not be grateful to her for 
 her efforts in Edward's behalf, and she took
 
 216 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 pride in securing an uninterrupted time for 
 Marie's painting. Marie was making a sketch 
 of the willows by the river, in the late after- 
 noons, after the children had had their tea, 
 and that was the hour that Theodora generally 
 chose to take Edward on a row up the river. 
 She had never been so happy as she was during 
 the hours when they glided over the smooth 
 water, with the sunset all aglow behind the sil- 
 very-green willows, and that touch of almost 
 unearthly beauty over the landscape which 
 comes but once in the twenty-four hours, and 
 seems all the more exquisite because it is so 
 soon to give place to darkness. As she and 
 her brother talked of many things, she had 
 the happy consciousness that the dreams of 
 her girlhood were being fulfilled in a measure, 
 for she was becoming indispensable to him ; 
 only it was all so sadly different! She had 
 hoped then to help him to accomplish some 
 great work that should make his name 
 famous throughout the world, and now she 
 could only help him to bear a great trial. 
 His increasing affection for her gave her a 
 sense of pleasure that was almost pain from 
 its keenness.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 217 
 
 And so, night after night, their friendship 
 grew, while Marie's sketch grew also. 
 
 One afternoon, while Marie was at work on 
 her picture, Mr. Compton came across the 
 little path that led past her retreat, and 
 stopped to look at her sketch. 
 
 " That is first-rate," he said, as he examined 
 it critically. " It is the best thing that you 
 have done for a long time." 
 
 " It ought to be good, for I have worked at 
 it until I have given myself a frightful head- 
 ache and rheumatism from having my feet on 
 this damp grass." 
 
 " It is too late for you to be out here ; give 
 me your traps and I will take them home for 
 you." 
 
 " I must do a little more," she pleaded, " for 
 the light is so beautiful, and it will never be 
 the same again." 
 
 He went into the next house, where Mrs. 
 Fraley lived, and presently returned with a 
 rag-mat for Mrs. Davidson to put under her 
 feet, and a coarse gray shawl that he threw 
 over her shoulders. The light was fast fading, 
 and a white mist was rising from the river. 
 He waited patiently until she should be ready 
 to go home.
 
 218 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Mrs. Fraley tells me that you come to see 
 her very often," said Marie, as she put the 
 finishing touches to a willow. " I think that 
 is so good of you. I wish you could hear 
 her praise you, poor old soul! It must be 
 a pleasure to be in one's right niche," she 
 continued with a little sigh. " Whenever 
 I am tired and discouraged, it is a comfort 
 to me to think that you are making every- 
 body happy, and doing your work in the best 
 possible way." 
 
 " But I don't," he said, with the flush of 
 color that any words of praise or blame al- 
 ways bi-ought to his sensitive face. "I do it 
 very badly. I constantly have the feeling 
 that I have only half expressed my thought 
 in my sermons, and that I don't do half I 
 ought to do for the parish." 
 
 " Everybody agrees with me in thinking 
 you are doing everything for the parish. 
 You can't really feel discouraged. Now with 
 me " She paused. 
 
 " I suppose we are all conscious of our 
 shortcomings," he rejoined. " Now your life 
 looks far more useful and satisfactory to me 
 than mine, for you are indispensable to your
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 219 
 
 family. My larger world could get on very 
 well without me, but your little world would 
 go to pieces if anything should happen to 
 you." 
 
 " My little world could get on very well 
 without me, for Theodora can manage the 
 household much better than I can." 
 
 " My dear Mrs. Davidson, don't allow 
 yourself to think such a thing for a moment. 
 Your sister-in-law cannot in the least fill your 
 place." 
 
 " She is so good," said Marie ; " but she is 
 unsympathetic sometimes, and she does not 
 understand me, and so she is cold and hard 
 occasionally." 
 
 " She can be cold and hard," he admitted. 
 The truth was that he had missed Theodora 
 unspeakably since her brother's return, and 
 her evident friendly indifference to himself cut 
 him to the quick. " She is never cold or hard 
 to Edward," justice compelled him to add. 
 
 " No ; she is absolutely devoted to him." 
 
 Marie was already regretting her lack of 
 loyalty in making any criticisms upon her 
 husband's sister, and changed the subject. 
 
 " I don't know why it is," she said, " but
 
 220 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 when I feel ill I can paint as I never can 
 when I am well. I have a feverish feeling 
 that some one is behind me urging me on and 
 guiding my hand." 
 
 " If you feel like that, you must go home 
 without painting another stroke." He took 
 her easel and sketch summarily into his pos- 
 session. " Wait a minute while I return Mrs. 
 Fraley's rug," he added, " and I will walk 
 home with you." 
 
 As they crossed the meadow together to- 
 wards the road, he said, " I am surprised that 
 Mr. and Miss Davidson let you paint to-day. 
 You look too ill to be out of the house ; " and 
 he glanced at her flushed cheeks. 
 
 " I don't tell them how I feel ; they are so 
 happy together that I don't want to spoil their 
 pleasure." 
 
 Her voice broke. She brushed her hand 
 hastily across her eyes, and made an effort to 
 control herself. 
 
 " It would spoil their pleasure a great deal 
 more if you were to be ill." 
 
 " Sometimes I wish I could be ill and die," 
 she cried passionately. " That would be much 
 the best way out of things."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 221 
 
 "Mrs. Davidson!" he exclaimed in dis- 
 tressed tones. " Think what the world would 
 be for your husband and children without you, 
 and for your friends ! You must not say such 
 things." 
 
 " Yes, I must. I had n't meant to tell you, 
 but I must speak to some one, or I shall go 
 insane. I am of no account in the world, or 
 even in my own family. Theodora is all in all 
 to Edward and the children, and I There 
 are worse things than losing one's right hand. 
 I am so sensitively organized that I am no 
 more fitted to cope with life than a cripple 
 or a deaf-mute. I am so weak that I am men- 
 tally crippled. I am a moral deaf-mute. I 
 do not dare to say what I think. Mr. Comp- 
 ton, if I am ever insane, you will know that 
 I was made mad, not by too much learning, 
 but by too much goodness. When you put a 
 woman like Theodora Davidson into daily con- 
 tact with a weak creature like myself, the re- 
 sults are worse than when the iron pot and 
 earthen vessel go down the stream together. 
 And, after all, is n't it partly the fault of the 
 pot for being too strong? " 
 
 Her eyes were very wistful and appeal-
 
 222 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 ing, and there was something infinitely touch- 
 ing in the dejected pose of her beautiful 
 head and the penetrating sadness of her low 
 voice. 
 
 " Mrs. Davidson, I am very sorry for you," 
 he said, much moved. " You have been work- 
 ing too hard, and so you see everything with 
 a twist. I am sure your state of mind is 
 merely temporary. You are worn out with 
 the terrible strain of Ned's accident." 
 
 Marie was silent, and they presently began 
 to talk of other things. 
 
 When Mr. Compton bade Mrs. Davidson 
 good-by at her gate, her conscience was already 
 reproaching her. 
 
 " I shall never forgive myself if what I 
 have told you has prejudiced you against 
 Theodora," she said. " She is so devoted 
 to me and mine that it is very ungrateful 
 in me to have these wretched, unjustifiable 
 feelings." 
 
 "Nothing can prejudice me against her. 
 She is so generous and magnanimous that I 
 am sure she would not consciously cause you a 
 moment's pain. Of course I can't help seeing 
 her occasional lack of sympathy ; but, take her
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 223 
 
 for all in all, she is the finest woman I have 
 ever known ; and so I am sure that everything 
 will come out right in the end. Good-by," 
 and he pressed her hand affectionately ; " you 
 will be happy when you are stronger." 
 
 She shook her head. "You are like Ed- 
 ward. He always expects everything to come 
 out right, but there is no cure for incompat- 
 ibility. It is an awful thing when two people 
 are forced to live under the same roof who 
 cannot understand each other, and who love a 
 third inmate of the household with their whole 
 strength while they hate each other in their 
 heart of hearts. "What have I said ? " 
 
 She was shocked when she heard the pent-up 
 feelings of months put into bald words, whose 
 strength she realized by their effect on her 
 companion. 
 
 " I don't know what is the matter with me," 
 she added, with a pathetic little break in her 
 voice. " Please forget everything that I have 
 said, and only remember that I am too ill and 
 unhappy to care whether I live or die. Theo- 
 dora is a fine woman. It is not her fault that 
 I am weak and jealous and tried by trifles. I 
 am glad that Edward has such a stimulating
 
 224 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 companion, and that the children are so well 
 cared for, at least I am when I am in my right 
 mind. Oh dear ! I don't see why sensitive 
 people were ever put into this rough world. 
 It is no place for them. Good-night."
 
 XVII. 
 
 MR. COMPTON was greatly worried by Mrs. 
 Davidson's condition, and he urged her hus- 
 band to take her away from Edgecomb at once, 
 for he believed that she would soon recover 
 her old tone in a more bracing climate. As 
 the baby and Guy were ailing too, he suggested 
 that their father and mother should take them 
 to the mountains, and that Miss Davidson 
 should stay behind with the older children. 
 
 Edward, however, could not see the neces- 
 sity of leaving his sister in Edgecomb. 
 
 " The poor girl has n't been 'away from 
 home all summer," he said. " And besides, I 
 should miss her dreadfully. She is awfully 
 sweet, Frank, if one is only unfortunate 
 enough. If we go at all, we must all go. 
 The family has been separated too much al- 
 ready. But, Frank, you don't think there is 
 anything seriously amiss with Marie?" he 
 asked anxiously. 
 
 " She had a severe strain at the time of
 
 226 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 your accident, and she seems very much out 
 of spirits, but I think all she needs is change 
 of air, rest, and your entire devotion. Have 
 you ever thought " He hesitated, and the 
 color came into his face. " Has it ever oc- 
 curred to you," he began again, " that, with the 
 best of intentions on both sides, and although 
 they are very fond of each other, your wife and 
 your sister are so fundamentally different that 
 they do not quite pull together ? " 
 
 " Thought of it ! Good Lord ! The thought 
 has been consuming me and preying into my 
 vitals, as it were, for the last six months. 
 Why should they pull together? My dear 
 boy, do you expect a thrush to be put in 
 harness comfortably with an eagle ? " 
 
 " Opposite* often have an attraction for 
 each other," Frank hazarded. 
 
 " ' I believe to you that,' as the Portu- 
 guese grammar says ; otherwise, Fanny, my 
 love, you and I would be bitter enemies." 
 
 " Ned, do stop joking for one moment. 
 Your wife may be seriously ill if something is 
 not done at once, and I am sure that she will 
 get well much faster if she and your sister are 
 separated for a few weeks : that is the plain 
 English of it."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 227 
 
 Edward's face grew grave. 
 
 " Then you will go away without your sis- 
 ter ? " Frank proceeded. 
 
 " No, I won't. It would make her too un- 
 happy; but I will promise to devote myself to 
 the thrush from early morn till dewy eve, and 
 let the eagle forage for herself." 
 
 Edward might talk in this light fashion, 
 but nevertheless he was greatly distressed and 
 perplexed. Ever since his return he had 
 been so absorbed in showing his gratitude to 
 his sister, whom he felt he had neglected in 
 the past, that he had forgotten his wife might 
 not sympathize with his changed point of view. 
 The pendulum, it seemed, had swung too far, 
 and now he must needs devote himself to his 
 wife, to the comparative neglect of his sister. 
 He felt that it would be better to take Theo- 
 dora away with them, for leaving her behind 
 would not tend to the solution of the real prob- 
 lem ; the same conditions would have to be 
 faced upon their return. No, he must needs 
 be the mediator between these two, and find 
 some way of satisfying them both. Theodora 
 had certainly been a most exasperating inmate 
 of the household at periods, but she had also
 
 228 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 shown great self-f orgetf ulness in taking charge 
 of a houseful of unruly children while Marie 
 was away, and she deserved a vacation. 
 
 As a consequence of this conversation, Lit- 
 tleton, New Hampshire, was selected as the 
 place for their summer outing, and rooms were 
 engaged there for the whole family. 
 
 As the day fixed upon for their departure 
 approached, it became evident that Marie was 
 in no condition to take the journey. She 
 was flushed and feverish, and had one or two 
 severe chills. Dr. Reycroft was summoned, 
 and forbade her going away from home at 
 present. At this juncture he went out of 
 town for a few days, leaving his patients in 
 charge of his assistant. As it was important 
 to get the baby and Guy and their father out 
 of the heat as soon as possible, Theodora pro- 
 posed to the young doctor that her brother 
 should establish the children and their nurse 
 at Littleton, and that she and her sister-in-law 
 should follow as soon as the latter was well 
 enough. Dr. Murdock acceded to her plan at 
 once. He was just out of the medical school, 
 and was by nature diffident and lacking in 
 self-confidence, and it was a relief to him, in
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 229 
 
 the absence of his chief, to lean upon Miss 
 Davidson's strength. Marie had been very 
 quiet and apathetic ever since she had opened 
 her heart to Mr. Compton, but she did not 
 hear this project in silence. 
 
 " I cannot let my husband go away," she 
 remonstrated timidly. " I would much rather 
 have him stay with me, and let Miss Davidson 
 take the children to Littleton." 
 
 Dr. Murdock disliked to take sides against 
 any woman. He fidgeted about nervously in 
 his chair, and looked out of the window. 
 
 " We hope to have you as right as a trivet 
 in two or three days," he said; "but your 
 husband needs the change, and in case of ill- 
 ness he would be, on account of his accident, 
 absolutely helpless, whereas Miss Davidson 
 is a born nurse," he added with admiration. 
 " You should see her superintending the nurses 
 at the hospital. By Jove ! I believe she knows 
 more about illness by intuition than I do after 
 all my study." 
 
 Marie's eyes filled with tears, and she 
 turned her face to the wall. She longed for 
 Dr. Reycrof t, who would have understood her ; 
 but she could not tell this young fellow, who
 
 230 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 admired Theodora so heartily, that she felt it 
 would kill her to have her for a nurse ; the 
 thing seemed too unreasonable ; he would think 
 that she was out of her mind. She pressed 
 her hand to her burning head, and wondered if 
 perhaps the fever had not crazed her already. 
 
 " When does Dr. Reycroft come back ? " she 
 asked. 
 
 " Day after to-morrow, and I hope by that 
 time that Mr. Davidson and the children will 
 be in Littleton, and that you can follow with 
 Miss Davidson the first of the Week." 
 
 She had a despairing sense of helplessness 
 as she heard these words, but she decided to 
 make a final appeal to her husband. It 
 chanced, however, that Theodora was unwit- 
 tingly the person to whom it was made. She 
 came into Marie's room to bring her some 
 sweet peas, soon after the doctor had departed. 
 It was a close, hot day, but Theodora looked 
 delightfully cool in a white dress, with pale- 
 blue ribbons around her waist and her throat. 
 She seemed the embodiment of health and 
 strength as she crossed the room. 
 
 "You look flushed," she said, as she left 
 the sweet peas on the table by Marie's side. 
 " Shall I open the other window? "
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 231 
 
 "No, thank you. I wish you would take 
 those flowers away; they make me ill. My 
 head is aching so that I can hardly bear it," 
 she added despairingly. 
 
 " I am so sorry. Shan't I stroke your 
 forehead ? Perhaps I could make the pain 
 go away." 
 
 " No, thank you. Where is Edward ? " 
 
 " He has gone down town." 
 
 " When he comes back, I want to see him." 
 
 " You shall, but until he comes I will sit in 
 the next room, where you can call me if you 
 want anything." 
 
 She was unbearable to Marie. Her neatly 
 arranged hair, her fresh, unruffled appearance, 
 a certain coolness of temperament and deft- 
 ness of touch, in short all the things which 
 united to make her a " born nurse," were to 
 poor Marie only so much fuel to fan the flame 
 of her irritation. Her nerves were quivering, 
 her whole energy was bent upon keeping her- 
 self on this side of the line " beyond which 
 madness lies." The fever was burning in her 
 brain, and it distorted everything. 
 
 Theodora, calm and unperturbed, went over 
 to Marie's work-table and took out some stock-
 
 232 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 ings that needed mending. Her soft tread 
 seemed like the tramp of an army to her sis- 
 ter-in-law. She crossed the room again, and 
 pushed up the other window. " I am sure 
 you will feel better if you have more air," she 
 observed. 
 
 Marie clenched her hands, but did not 
 speak. 
 
 Theodora stopped to straighten a rug, and 
 then started to take the sweet peas out of the 
 room. 
 
 " Leave them," Marie commanded, " I like 
 to see them ; but oh, do, do go away ! " 
 
 " Why, Marie ! " Theodora said in surprise, 
 " what has come over you ? " and she added 
 in a low tone, " It is the fever." 
 
 " It is not the fever. I am quite myself. 
 Do go away, please, and tell Dr. Murdock 
 that I don't want you for a nurse. I want 
 Edward, even if he doesn't know anything 
 about illness. You can take the children to 
 Littleton, and let him stay with me." 
 
 Theodora was too good a nurse to urge the 
 wisdom of her own plans when her patient 
 was in such an excitable condition, so she 
 said gently, " Very well, dear, if you prefer it
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 233 
 
 Edward shall stay with you, and I will take 
 the children to Littleton. And if any one 
 else is needed, we can get a trained nurse from 
 the hospital," she added, half to herself. 
 
 Marie shuddered. " Oh, not a trained nurse, 
 Theodora ! That would be terrible. I could 
 not have a stranger take care of me. Promise 
 me that I shall not have a trained nurse, what- 
 ever happens," she entreated. 
 
 " My dear, I can't promise that ; but I 
 don't believe there will be any need of one ; 
 there certainly will not if I stay here." 
 
 " But I want Edward." 
 
 " You shall have him," Theodora said sooth- 
 ingly. " He will stay with you in any event." 
 
 Marie sank back on her pillows and seemed 
 comforted. " You are telling me the truth ? " 
 she asked presently. " I shall not wake up 
 some morning and find Edward gone ? " 
 
 " Marie, have I ever deceived you?" 
 
 " No, you never have." 
 
 Everything might have gone on with out- 
 ward tranquillity, and Theodora might never 
 have discovered her sister-in-law's real feel- 
 ings, if there had not been at this moment a 
 loud wail from the lower regions, where the
 
 234 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 children were playing. Into the midst of this 
 war Theodora descended like an avenging 
 goddess. She upbraided them for making a 
 noise and disturbing their mother, and she 
 thrust Guy, who seemed to be the ringleader, 
 into the depths of the hall closet. When she 
 returned, Marie drew from her a full account 
 of the fray. 
 
 " I can't have my little Guy punished in 
 that cruel way," she said, with heightened 
 color. " He is terribly afraid of the dark ; 
 when I shut him up in the closet I always 
 shut myself in with him, so he shall not be 
 frightened. Go down at once, Theodora, and 
 let him out." 
 
 " But, my dear," Theodora expostulated, 
 " I told him he must stay there until he prom- 
 ised to be good." 
 
 " He never will ; he is n't that kind. Go 
 down at once, Theodora." 
 
 Theodora obeyed, somewhat reluctantly, but 
 she stayed with Guy until he gave the re- 
 quired promise. She found Marie quivering 
 with excitement upon her return. " You did 
 not let him out at once," she said. "I can't 
 allow you to go to Littleton, if you are going
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 235 
 
 to put my children in the closet. Do you often 
 punish them ? " 
 
 " Very seldom." 
 
 " You have n't ever slapped their hands, 
 have you ? " Marie asked with sudden sus- 
 picion. 
 
 " Marie, you can trust me never to punish 
 them when it is not necessary, nor to hurt 
 them severely, for I love them too well." 
 
 " I can't have their hands slapped," Marie 
 cried. " You must promise me never to slap 
 their hands, never, never, Theodora. I would 
 not have believed it of you. I knew that you 
 were sometimes cold and unkind to older 
 people, but I thought wou loved children." 
 
 "I, cold and unkind to older people ? 
 What do you mean ? Don't be afraid of 
 telling me the whole truth." 
 
 " If you want the truth, you shall have it," 
 said Marie desperately. " You are sometimes 
 cold and hard, because you have n't the faint- 
 est conception of what it means to put your- 
 self in another person's place." 
 
 " Marie ! I am putting myself in your place 
 now, and I know just how ill you are feeling, 
 and that by and by "
 
 236 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " No, it is n't that. I may not have the 
 courage to speak by and by, but I shall be 
 feeling angry and rebellious just the same." 
 
 " Angry and rebellious on account of some- 
 thing that I have done ? " Theodora asked 
 anxiously. " Tell me what you object to, and 
 and I won't do it any more." 
 
 A sudden wicked impulse came to Marie, 
 apparently from the outside, to let Theodora 
 know all that was in her mind. Perhaps she 
 had already crossed the line where responsi- 
 bility ends. 
 
 " It would be easier to tell you what you 
 have not done," she said passionately. " Ever 
 since you came here, you have been doing first 
 one thing and then another. You took away 
 the housekeeping ; you wanted to give my 
 child an odious name ; you cut off my little 
 girls' beautiful curls ; and you turned our 
 comfortable studio into a prim place, where 
 Edward would not work because it was so 
 unhomelike." 
 
 " Marie ! " 
 
 " You think I am delirious. If you won't 
 believe me, ask Edward ; perhaps you will 
 believe him."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 237 
 
 " My dear, you must stop talking, or the 
 doctor will never forgive me." 
 
 " I am sure you think that I am out of 
 my head, but I am not. I sometimes fancy I 
 shall be insane, and if I am it will be you who 
 have brought it about, you ! And you want 
 me to stop talking and to think of something 
 else ! Oh, I have such a pain in my head," 
 she moaned, u and I feel so ill ! Won't you 
 go down town and get Edward, please ? " 
 
 " He has been with you all night and all 
 to-day. He is so used up that he needs the 
 rest, but I will let Elizabeth take my place 
 now, and I will send him to you the minute 
 he comes home." 
 
 " You consider me selfish and exacting, and 
 so you are taking Edward away from me 
 more and more. You think me too weak and 
 incapable to do things for him and the chil- 
 dren, but I was strong enough to be Edward's 
 nurse, and the doctor said a trained nurse 
 could not have done better. I was strong 
 enough to stay with him all through the ter- 
 rible operation, so that my face should be the 
 last thing he should see before he was uncon- 
 scious, and the first thing when he came out
 
 238 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 of the ether." She covered her face with her 
 hands. " It was horrible ! I cannot bear to 
 think of it." 
 
 " It must have been an awful shock," said 
 Theodora, " and you had n't the strength to 
 bear it ; if I had only gone to him and " 
 
 " You ? You feel that you can make every- 
 thing right in God's universe; and yet, if it 
 had n't been for you, he might be well now." 
 
 " What do you mean ? " 
 
 " You drove him away. You made him go 
 to the Rangeley Lakes because home was so 
 uncomfortable. If he had stayed at home, he 
 would be well now." 
 
 At last Theodora lost control over herself. 
 " I sometimes think that if I had gone to him 
 he would be well now," she said. 
 
 Marie started up in bed. Her eyes grew 
 wild, and she gave a low cry. " Theodora ! 
 oh, Theodora, you will kill me if you say 
 that ! Go away ! Oh, go away ! I wish 
 that you would go out of the house, out of 
 the town, far, far away, and that I might 
 never, never see you again ! And if you won't 
 believe me, ask Mr. Compton if he did not 
 say that you could be hard and cold, and ask
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 239 
 
 Edward if he did not say, over and over 
 again, that he wished you would go, but that 
 'unfortunately one could not divorce a sister!' 
 Shut the door, and don't dare to come in here 
 again to-day ! "
 
 XVIII. 
 
 AT first Theodora had regarded Marie's 
 words as having but a slight foundation of 
 truth, which her excitable state of mind mag- 
 nified, but what she said concerning Edward 
 smote her to the heart. Marie could not have 
 invented the sentence about his wishing that 
 he could divorce a sister. The idea that her 
 brother had ever wanted her to leave him 
 came like a bolt from a clear sky. The 
 events of the past fourteen months flashed be- 
 fore her in swift succession. Could it be that 
 all the deeds that she had done from the most 
 conscientious of motives had merely resulted 
 in alienating from her the affection of her 
 brother and his wife ? She had a horrible 
 feeling of black depression, without a glimpse 
 of light. If these things that Marie had said 
 were true, where was there any comfort or 
 hope for her ? 
 
 Edward had not yet come in, so Theodora 
 sent Elizabeth to Marie, and, hastily putting
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 241 
 
 on her hat, she went out into the intense 
 August heat. Not a breath was stirring, 
 and almost all the inhabitants of Edgecomb 
 were sheltered behind green blinds. She went 
 swiftly down the main street, thinking only of 
 the terrible words which had burned into her 
 very soul ; and as she thought of them, a 
 blind anger seized her against the woman who 
 had made such havoc in her happy life. And 
 everybody loved Marie ; even Francis Comp- 
 ton had nothing but praise for her ; while, in 
 speaking of herself, he who had known her in 
 her great sorrow had called her hard and cold. 
 As she went along the quiet street and glanced 
 at the familiar houses, she thought of the 
 bright day, scarcely more than a year ago, 
 when she had passed them on her first arrival, 
 with her brother by her side, proud and happy 
 to have her with him, and in the bitterness of 
 her heart she cried out, " It is that woman 
 who has done it ; it is she who has poisoned 
 Edward's mind." She kept on and on, past 
 the shops, where a few loafers were lazily 
 smoking, who looked at her as one looks at a 
 brilliant comet; past the parsonage, with its 
 green blinds closed ; and then on and on until
 
 242 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 she came to the little cemetery, green and 
 white, and hardly more peaceful than the town 
 itself. She had had no object in view when 
 she started on her walk, but she turned in at 
 the gate, as if it had been her destination from 
 the first. She walked along its shady paths 
 until she came to the Davidson lot, and then 
 she sank down on the bank outside of the iron, 
 vine-covered fence. The sight of the graves 
 of her father and mother brought the past 
 more vividly before her than anything else 
 could have done. She saw herself, a slim, 
 overgrown girl, with a heart full of passionate 
 rebellion against her father and his new wife ; 
 and then as a hard-working student, too bent 
 on accomplishing her education to have time 
 for girlish friendships ; and again she saw 
 herself in the coveted position of teacher of 
 other girls. She had been happier then, for 
 the girls had admired her, and she had been of 
 use ; but she asked herself if even then she had 
 been greatly loved. Was she to go through 
 her whole life regarded merely as a useful 
 woman and an agreeable acquaintance, when 
 she was hungering and thirsting for love ? 
 For the love of a brother and his wife and
 
 THE COMING OF TUEODOEA. 243 
 
 their children? a love that happier women 
 hardly remember to be grateful for, counting 
 it as a matter of course. Must her life always 
 be full of work, work, work, with no thanks 
 and scant affection? Was there no one to 
 understand her ? No one to realize that she 
 was human, and cared for all the things that 
 other women love? How long she stayed 
 there she did not know, but she was finally 
 aroused from her reverie by the sight of fleecy 
 clouds in the west, tinged with pink, and, has- 
 tily rising, she went swiftly out of the gate 
 and turned towards home. As she passed the 
 parsonage, Mr. Compton, who had seen her 
 approaching, came out to ask the latest news 
 concerning Mrs. Davidson, but she did not see 
 him and went quickly by the house. 
 
 " Miss Davidson," he called after her, 
 "are you trying to escape from your best 
 friends?" 
 
 " No," she said, turning a face towards him 
 that was tragic in its expression of hopeless- 
 ness ; " I am only trying to escape from my- 
 self." 
 
 " What has happened ? " he asked anxiously. 
 " Is Marie worse ? "
 
 244 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " She is no worse ; you need n't be alarmed, 
 nothing has happened. At least," her scru- 
 pulous truthfulness impelled her to add, " no- 
 thing has happened that makes a difference to 
 any one but me." 
 
 " But if it concerns you, it will make a dif- 
 ference to me." 
 
 " You like to say pleasant things," she said 
 bitterly. 
 
 " I like to say the truth-." 
 
 " What is the truth ? " she cried passion- 
 ately. " All through the year I have thought 
 that it was a happiness to my brother and his 
 wife to have me live with them, and, now that 
 Marie is too ill to control her words, I find that 
 it was all a mask, a hideous mask of hypocrisy, 
 and that in reality they were longing to have 
 me go away. God deliver us from the truth ! 
 God keep us blind always, or else let us have 
 the truth in the beginning ! If they had told 
 me frankly at first that I tried to rule their 
 lives too much, I would have gone back to my 
 teaching; but to tell me now, when I have 
 grown to love the children as if they were my 
 very own, and my brother far more than most 
 women love their husbands, is too cruel."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 245 
 
 " There must be some mistake," Frank said 
 gently. " I am sure your brother loves you 
 dearly, and, if his wife has been made jeal- 
 ous by his affection for you, it is not strange 
 if, in her excitable condition, she magnifies 
 everything. Perhaps you said something, 
 quite inadvertently of course, that made her 
 angry." 
 
 " I gave her no provocation that I can re- 
 member, but she upbraided me for one thing 
 after another, and finally said that I had 
 driven Edward away from home, and therefore 
 that I was responsible for his accident. Oh, I 
 did say something then ! I lost my self-control, 
 and I said that I sometimes thought that if I 
 had gone to him he would be well now." 
 
 " But that was unkind. How could you say 
 such a thing to the poor child ? " 
 
 " She had said things twenty times as cruel 
 to me." 
 
 " But she is ill in mind and body, and 
 you " - 
 
 " I did not mean to say it. I have wanted 
 to say it many, many times, but I had never 
 said it before. I tried hard to be fair-minded 
 and sympathetic ; in all my life I have never
 
 246 THE CONING OF THEODORA. 
 
 tried so hard ; but the words escaped me in 
 spite of myself." 
 
 " Go back and beg her pardon. Ask her to 
 forgive you for all your unconscious mistakes, 
 and tell her that you have seen me, and that 
 I feel sure it would have made no difference if 
 you had gone to Edward. She will worry her- 
 self into a fever, if she lies there thinking that 
 she was partly responsible for the loss of his 
 hand. And even now she will be consumed 
 with penitence for her words to you. You do 
 not understand her. Hers is an exceptionally 
 sensitive nature. Go back and comfort her, 
 and all may yet be right." 
 
 " If Comfort her ? I ask her pardon ? " 
 " Yes, for you are strong, and she is ill." 
 " How you all love her ! " she said vehe- 
 mently. " Put her charming personality out 
 of your mind and think only of the bare facts. 
 Don't think of me or of her, but of the right 
 and the wrong of the question, and then you 
 will not be governed by a personal bias. If 
 you think of her, you can't no man could 
 help deciding in her favor." 
 
 " It is of the right and the wrong of the 
 question that I am thinking. If I allowed
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 247 
 
 a personal bias to govern me, I should decide 
 in favor of you," he said impulsively. 
 
 For a moment she raised her clear blue 
 eyes to his, and a delicate color swept over her 
 face ; then she looked away from him, and 
 began to talk in a matter-of-fact way about 
 the advisability of getting a trained nurse for 
 Marie. 
 
 When he left Theodora at her gate, he gave 
 her hand a warm pressure, and said, " If I can 
 do anything for you, you know that you can 
 count upon me always." 
 
 Theodora went directly upstairs to Marie's 
 room. Her anger had spent itself, and in 
 the reaction her mind was full of forgiving 
 thoughts. 
 
 Marie caught sight of her as she opened 
 the door. 
 
 " Take that woman away ! " she cried. " She 
 is a horrid woman a hideous, ugly, excel- 
 lent, virtuous woman ! " 
 
 The little doctor, who was sitting in the 
 room with Edward and the maid, came apolo- 
 getically into the entry and closed the door 
 behind him. 
 
 " She has been violently delirious for the
 
 248 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 last hour," he explained, " and something 
 seems to excite her against you. Sick people, 
 you know, often take a dislike to their best 
 friends. I have telephoned to Dr. Reycroft, 
 and he will get back to-morrow morning, I am 
 happy to say ; I have given her husband and 
 the maid full directions as to what is to 
 be done until he comes ; and I am sorry, but 
 I am afraid that it will be best for you to keep 
 out of the room." 
 
 That evening, as Edward and his sister sat 
 forlornly over their tea, he asked her what she 
 thought of Marie's condition. " Murdock is 
 non-committal," he added. " It is my belief 
 that he does not know as much about the case 
 as you do." 
 
 " That is very true," she said faintly. " I 
 know altogether too much about it; I know 
 that, quite unwittingly, I have aggravated her 
 condition." 
 
 "You, Theo?" 
 
 His surprised tone gave her a moment of 
 hope. 
 
 " She thinks that I have taken too much 
 upon my shoulders ; that I have been man- 
 aging ; and it has worried her. I only meant
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 249 
 
 to save her, but it seems Edward," she 
 asked desperately, "is it true that you, too, 
 have wished that I would go away? Did 
 you ever say, I entreat you to tell me the 
 absolute truth, it is a matter of vital impor- 
 tance, did you say that 'unfortunately one 
 could never divorce a sister ' ? " 
 
 Poor Edward was very unhappy. There 
 was something in his sister's burning gaze 
 that demanded the whole truth. " Dear child," 
 he said finally, " you know my joking way. 
 You must never take what I say seriously. 
 I dare say I may have said a hundred things 
 of the kind. And yet in my heart I am only 
 too delighted to have you live here always, and 
 so will Marie be when she is herself again." 
 
 " No, Edward," she said, shaking her head 
 sorrowfully, "nothing can ever be the same 
 again. Poor Marie ! How much she must 
 have suffered before she, a woman who would 
 rather die than give the humblest creature 
 pain, could have said the things she did ! 
 But oh, Edward, why did you not tell me the 
 truth ? I would have gone away in a moment, 
 if you had only given me the slightest hint." 
 
 " Theo, my dear Theo ! " He rose as he
 
 250 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 spoke and came over to her end of the table. 
 She rose, too. They stood looking at each 
 other mournfully. 
 
 " My dear, you know that I am impatient, 
 and I was tried by your constant efforts to 
 reform me. That was all my fault. If I 
 had only been the model fellow you wanted 
 to make me, I should never have had any 
 little feelings of irritation. If, like ' pretty 
 little Mary Wood, I had always done the best 
 I could ' " - 
 
 " Don't, Edward, this is no time for joking." 
 " Theo, dear," and he flung his arms around 
 her and kissed her, " let us forget it all and 
 make a fresh start. I am awfully fond of you 
 now. We will wash off the slate and do the 
 sums all over again, just as we used to do 
 when we were children. Don't you remember 
 how you helped me with my arithmetic ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I must have been an odious, man- 
 aging little thing, even then." 
 
 " Come, dear, shall we forgive and forget? " 
 
 " W r e will forgive, Edward, but such things 
 
 can't be forgotten. They have gone too deep. 
 
 Marie can never love me after this ; and if 
 
 I stayed on, now that I know how she feels
 
 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 251 
 
 towards me, I should be miserable. Fancy 
 living in an atmosphere where you were con- 
 scious every moment that you were disliked ! " 
 
 " Marie does n't dislike you, Theo. She has 
 a very high opinion of you, and as soon as 
 she is stronger she will get over being troubled 
 by the little things that have disturbed her." 
 
 She shook her head. " You know that is n't 
 true. You are only saying that to make me 
 happier. She may have a high opinion of 
 my character ; I suppose she feels that my 
 intentions are good ; that, in short, I am an 
 ' excellent, virtuous woman,' but she does n't 
 love me, and she never will. It does no good 
 to refuse to face things fairly and squarely ; 
 and, now that I know the truth at last, I am 
 sure that there is nothing for me to do but to 
 go away." 
 
 " But, Theo, where will you go ? " 
 
 " To Littleton with the children, and while 
 there I will make some plan." 
 
 " We can't give you up permanently, Theo," 
 he said, with a sudden sense of the loss that 
 would come to his life if she were taken en- 
 tirely out of it. " Marie will be the first, when 
 she is well, to urge you to stay. You can live
 
 252 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 with us, and let her take charge of things her- 
 self." 
 
 " Edward, what opinion would you have of 
 me, if I should stay after what has happened ? 
 And don't think that I blame either you or 
 Marie. I am not the kind of person who 
 was ever meant to live in a home. I was 
 intended " 
 
 " Theo," and again he put his arm around 
 her and drew her towards him. " Dear old 
 Theo, I really don't know how I can get along 
 without you. You have been so good to me 
 these last few weeks ! I can't let you go." 
 
 " Don't you see, dear," she said very gently, 
 " that the only thing I can do for you is to 
 leave you ? Go up to Marie now, and if you 
 want anything, call me. I shall be in the next 
 room, where I can get anything you need, but 
 where I shall not trouble her." 
 
 And all that night the brother and sister 
 kept watch ; he where he could comfort Marie, 
 and she, like some outcast, sitting alone in the 
 darkness, that she might not disturb her, think- 
 ing through the long night of her bleak future. 
 
 When Dr. Reycroft returned, his cheery, 
 confident presence in the sick-room did much
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 253 
 
 in itself for Marie. He pronounced that she 
 had malarial fever, but did not seem in the 
 least alarmed by her condition. He secured 
 a trained nurse from the hospital, whom he 
 introduced to Marie as a friend of his, and 
 he summarily dispatched Theodora with the 
 children and their nurse to Littleton. 
 
 "Theo is a fine girl," Edward said of her to 
 Frank the next time he saw him; "there is 
 nothing small about her. Just rouse her suffi- 
 ciently, and she will not stick at any generous 
 deed. But it takes a cannon-ball to do it! 
 Any other woman would have been made alive 
 to the fact that a battle was impending by 
 the sharpshooting that has been going on all 
 summer." 
 
 " I think she is n't sensitive because she is 
 more high-minded and straightforward than 
 the rest of us," Frank returned. " She is so 
 truthful that she expects it of other people." 
 
 " But, Heaven help us, Frank ! We can't 
 all of us go through the world telling our 
 fellow-creatures in plain words what we think 
 of them. It may be high-minded and straight- 
 forward, but it would be deucedly unpleas- 
 ant."
 
 254 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " We might be more sincere than we are, 
 however." 
 
 " Come, now, Fanny, my love. You have 
 nothing with which to accuse yourself. If 
 you are going to be any more sincere, just 
 say good-by, once for all now, to Edward 
 Davidson."
 
 XIX. 
 
 A COLD, drizzling rain greeted Theodora 
 and her party upon their arrival at Little- 
 ton. The mountains had entirely vanished 
 behind the mist, and the view consisted of a 
 number of ugly little houses in the immedi- 
 ate foreground, with a rolling, hilly country in 
 the middle distance, sparsely dotted with trees. 
 The cottage where they had rooms was con- 
 nected with the hotel by a steep ascent of 
 planking and steps under a covered way, but 
 the rain came in at the sides with such relent- 
 less persistence that, if it continued, their 
 three meals a day promised to afford a water- 
 cure. Theodora was so homesick and unset- 
 tled that the feeling amounted to physical and 
 mental misery. The whole depressing, rain- 
 blurred view seemed a fitting accompaniment 
 to her frame of mind. Her reason told her 
 that she would see sunshine and mountains 
 some time, and that her life would by and by 
 have a brighter outlook; but at present the
 
 256 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 sunshine, both real and metaphorical, seemed 
 very far away. She sat down on her trunk, 
 in the midst of the chaos of a first arrival, and 
 wondered how she could live through the four 
 weeks of her allotted stay, to say nothing of 
 the drearier life that lay beyond, for here she 
 at least had the children. It was not until 
 they were asleep that she had time to let her 
 thoughts dwell continuously on herself. As she 
 sat in her forlorn room, ostensibly writing let- 
 ters by the light of a kerosene lamp, while 
 the rain beat against the window-panes, her 
 thoughts compassed her whole past. Very 
 dreary and profitless it seemed to her ; and if 
 she had been asked at that moment if life were 
 worth the living, she would have answered 
 with an emphatic " No." It counted for no- 
 thing that she had been radiantly happy dur- 
 ing the last fourteen months, now that she 
 knew she had made such a miserable failure 
 of her opportunities. To feel dissatisfied with 
 herself, and thoroughly, abjectly humble, was 
 a sensation as novel as it was overwhelming. 
 These appalling discoveries as to her own 
 character that had been forced upon her were 
 the hardest features in the affair. Heretofore
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 257 
 
 she had never questioned that her aims were 
 of the highest, and that she was to be a power 
 in the community ; but she had been awak- 
 ened from her happy confidence with such a 
 rude shock that she felt a distrust of herself 
 and of all her schemes and plans. The prac- 
 tical difficulties of her position next presented 
 themselves, and she asked herself to what 
 she should turn her hand in the future ; for, 
 although she had sufficient income to live 
 where she pleased, she knew that she would 
 never be contented to lead an idle life. It 
 was too late in the year to get a position as 
 teacher, but what did it matter ? She felt that 
 the spring of her ambition was broken. The 
 only part of the last fourteen months which it 
 did not fill her with pain and humiliation to 
 contemplate was her friendship with Francis 
 Compton ; but even here she could find little 
 satisfaction, for their intercourse must inevita- 
 bly come to an end, together with all other 
 good things, when she should leave Edgecomb. 
 In the weeks that followed, she managed 
 to keep busy, and so in a measure to drive 
 away thought, but there was an undercurrent* 
 of depression that made the background for
 
 258 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 each day. To add to the general dreariness, 
 the weather settled down into a succession of 
 northeast storms, with but fleeting glimpses 
 of sunshine and mountain views. Happily 
 the news from home was the least discourag- 
 ing part of the situation. Marie continued 
 to improve slowly, and the delirium had left 
 her. As soon as she was a little stronger, 
 Edward was going to take her to the seashore, 
 where the doctor hoped that a few weeks of 
 rest would completely bring back her strength. 
 There was little variety in Theodora's daily 
 routine, for as her rooms were in the cottage 
 she did not mix much with the other guests, 
 who were civil and polite, but who interested 
 her no more in her present frame of mind 
 than figures in a pantomime. 
 
 At the end of a fortnight the storms were 
 over and the sun came radiantly forth, and 
 Theodora could not resist the contagion of the 
 children's exuberant spirits when they enticed 
 her into the grove behind the house, for long 
 mornings or afternoons, where her keen love 
 of beauty could not but find pleasure in the 
 fine mountain views, with their shifting lights 
 and shadows.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 259 
 
 One afternoon, at the beginning of the 
 third week of her absence from home, she was 
 in the grove with the children as usual. She 
 had a book in her hand, but her eyes wan- 
 dered to that distant horizon line, misty and 
 undulating, and like an unsubstantial vision 
 of some brighter world. She was happy with- 
 out knowing why. It was as if a hand had 
 suddenly pulled up the black curtain that had 
 been stretched between her and the future. 
 She had a sensation of physical pleasure that 
 was almost intoxicating in contrast to her 
 former depression. 
 
 She heard the sound of approaching foot- 
 steps, and looked up, expecting to see one of 
 the guests from the hotel. 
 
 " Here you are," said a familiar voice. " I 
 was sure I could find you." 
 
 " Mr. Compton ! " she exclaimed, as she 
 rose hastily ; " I don't think I was ever so glad 
 to see any one before. How do you happen 
 to be in this part of the world ? " 
 
 " I came because I could n't help it. Are 
 you really glad to see me?" he asked eagerly, 
 as he took her outstretched hand. Something 
 in his imploring glance caused her to drop her 
 eyes.
 
 260 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " I am very glad indeed to see any friend 
 of Edward's," she replied stiffly. " Have you 
 ever seen anything so lovely as that view ? " 
 she added nervously, as she pointed to the 
 distant mountains. 
 
 " It is beautiful. Miss Davidson, will you 
 mind if I stay here for a few days ? I am at 
 Thayer's, in the village. Of course I can 
 leave Littleton, if you insist upon it; but I 
 have never seen such a heavenly place, and 
 I do want to see the children. I might be 
 of use," he added plaintively, " for I can tell 
 better stories than you can, you remember, 
 being a minister. Besides, I shall not have 
 any chance to get too absorbed by the details 
 of my profession. You can take me in hand 
 and quite make me over. May I stay ? " 
 
 She could not help smiling. "I shall be 
 only too glad to have you stay, if " 
 
 " If I am here merely as a kind of nursery 
 governess for the children, an adjunct to 
 Elizabeth, in short. I don't care in what 
 capacity I stay, provided you don't turn me 
 out." 
 
 He stood watching her changing expression, 
 as if he could not take his eyes from her face.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 261 
 
 " You look well," he said at last ; " you have 
 grown brown and sunburned." 
 
 " How are Marie and Edward ? " she asked. 
 " Or have you been away from Edgecomb 
 all the time?" 
 
 " I have been away, but I stopped there 
 last night to get the latest news for you." 
 
 " That was very good of you." 
 
 " I am afraid it was merely very selfish. 
 I knew that I was sure of a welcome, if I 
 brought news from them. Marie is really 
 quite herself again ; and Edward is as de- 
 lightful and as amusing as ever. He has had 
 a hard time, poor fellow, but no one would 
 ever imagine it." 
 
 Mr. Compton took tea with Theodora and 
 the children that night, and while she went 
 down to the cottage with them afterwards, he 
 stayed on the hotel piazza chatting with the 
 guests, and discovering more about them in 
 the hour and a half which followed than she 
 had done in three weeks. She told him that 
 she would be free again at eight o'clock, and 
 precisely at that hour he joined her on the 
 cottage piazza. 
 
 " What a glorious night it is," he said.
 
 262 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " One does not know what moonlight means 
 until one sees it in the mountains. Would 
 you mind walking up the road a little way ? 
 We could get so much more of a view higher 
 up." 
 
 " I should like it." 
 
 They crossed a bridge which spanned a tiny 
 stream, and went on past a house that was 
 buried in flowers, and then higher, and still 
 higher, until they reached the summit of the 
 hill. At their feet was a silvery, misty world, 
 for the lower hills were hidden by a filmy, 
 shimmering covering of mist, which looked 
 like an immense lake of some substance more 
 ethereal than water ; while above and beyond 
 it were the sharp outlines of the Franconia 
 mountains, and in the distance the dreamlike, 
 undulating lines of the Presidential range. 
 On the other side, to complete the marvelous 
 view, were the faint outlines of the far-away 
 mountains in Vermont. Heretofore, at the 
 glare of high noon, Theodora had thought 
 this hill a prosaic spot ; but now, in the moon- 
 light, and with a companion by her side who 
 was keenly alive to beauty, it seemed enchant- 
 ingly poetic.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 263 
 
 It was not until they had descended the 
 hill, and she turned to take leave of Mr. 
 Compton at the door of her cottage, that he 
 uttered one word betokening anything more 
 than friendly interest. 
 
 " Good-night," she said. " It is such a 
 pleasure to have you here." 
 
 " Theodora," he returned, " I have promised 
 to stay on your terms, and so I won't venture 
 to say half how much I love you ; but the 
 whole world has seemed full of you since you 
 went away, and I have felt as if nothing was 
 any good that was n't somehow connected with 
 you." 
 
 " Oh, please don't." 
 
 " No, I won't ; but I must just beg you not 
 to decide this thing too quickly. If you don't 
 feel sure that you would be happy with me, 
 don't feel too sure that you would be unhappy. 
 Might n't you be happier than to go away as 
 you mean to do ? Theodora, I need you so 
 much. Don't answer me until we are in Edge- 
 comb again. To-morrow it will be exactly as 
 if I had not said this to-night ; " and before 
 she could recover from her surprise, he had 
 gone out of the gate and was walking rapidly 
 down the road.
 
 264 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 She sat for a long time in front of her 
 window, letting her eyes absently rest on the 
 silver flood of moonlight in the valley and on 
 the distant mountain peaks. 
 
 She was loved, really loved ! In 110 period 
 of her life could this fact have given her such 
 keen and exquisite pleasure, such a thrill of 
 surprise, and such humble gratitude, for of 
 late she had been thinking of herself as a 
 woman who was destined to go through life 
 without the power to touch the heart. It al- 
 most seemed as if she could not help giving 
 her heart in return. Could she not love him 
 enough to make him happy ? But no ; for 
 although it gave her pleasure to be with him, 
 her pulse-beats did not quicken when he was 
 near, and she had none of that unreasoning 
 admiration of him which she had always 
 thought she should feel for a lover. She had 
 sometimes fancied herself in love with some 
 man physically and intellectually her supe- 
 rior, who would sway her, rule her, perchance 
 even break her spirit. She felt that she had 
 it in her to be the wife of a statesman, and to 
 help him guide the affairs of state ; or of a 
 justice on the bench, or a general, or an Eng-
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 265 
 
 lish peer. It was not mere worldly ambition, 
 however, that attracted her, for she would 
 have cheerfully married a ranchman, and 
 buried herself from the world for life, or a 
 philanthropist who had chosen to live in the 
 worst slums of a city, provided that he were 
 a king among men. And the only man who 
 had ever fallen in love with her was a coun- 
 try minister, without ambition, a lovable, 
 sweet-tempered fellow, who was neither intel- 
 lectual nor especially interesting. If she mar- 
 ried him, her way would always lie in quiet, 
 home-keeping paths ; for she had learned this 
 much from her late experience, that, if she be- 
 came his wife, she must help him to be happy 
 in his way and not in hers. And yet to be 
 loved was so great a thing ! But even here 
 she was not satisfied, for his affection was not 
 the passionate devotion she craved. It was a 
 compound of pity for her and need of her. 
 She felt that the time had come when he could 
 love again, and that she was the woman who 
 had chanced to come in his way. Alas ! she 
 did not love him, and to-morrow she must tell 
 him so and send him away. 
 
 The next morning, as she was leaving the
 
 266 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 breakfast-table, a lady stopped her and said : 
 " I want to tell you how much I like your 
 brother." 
 
 " Where have you seen him ? " she asked 
 with her face all aglow. 
 
 " Last night, when you were at the cot- 
 tage." 
 
 " Oh, that is n't my brother ; that is Mr. 
 Compton, his most intimate friend, who came 
 to bring me the latest news from home." 
 
 So it seemed, Theodora thought, with a little 
 pang, she was the kind of woman that no one 
 would dream could have a lover ! 
 
 Later in the morning Frank Compton ap- 
 peared, and proposed that Miss Davidson 
 should climb Parker Mountain with him. The 
 children were eager to go too, and were with 
 difficulty persuaded that it would be too hard 
 an expedition for them. 
 
 " I made up my mind last night that I 
 ought to tell you it will do no good for you to 
 stay," Theodora said resolutely. 
 
 " At least it won't do any harm, since you 
 have forewarned me," he returned cheerfully. 
 
 She wished she knew just how much he 
 cared for her and why, but reticence and her
 
 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 267 
 
 nice sense of honor forbade her taking any 
 steps to discover. 
 
 Their way led at first through the valley, 
 where the scorching sun fell full upon them, 
 but after a time it began to ascend the moun- 
 tain, under the grateful shade of a forest of 
 pines and hemlocks. Far above them were a 
 tiny white house and a tower that marked the 
 end of their expedition. The sky was blue 
 and cloudless, and the air was laden with a 
 fragrance of the woods. It was one of those 
 days when to be alive is so keen a pleasure 
 that it makes up for months of more conven- 
 tional living. Theodora had a light-hearted, 
 happy feeling, such as she had not known for 
 weeks. The certainty that this man loved her 
 gave an added touch of beauty to the world. 
 It was true that she did not love him, and 
 perhaps a stern moralist, such as she herself 
 had once been, would say that she should 
 have insisted upon his going away at once ; 
 but she was no longer capable of being a stern 
 moralist, she was too hungry and thirsty for 
 happiness. What harm would a few days of 
 happiness do either of them? After that he 
 would go back to Edgecomb, and she ? Some-
 
 268 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 where in the world there would be work for 
 her. 
 
 "I should like to stay out-of-doors every 
 moment of my time from May until Novem- 
 ber," she exclaimed presently. 
 
 " So should I. I wish you could have gone 
 to the Kangeley Lakes. How you would 
 enjoy it ! I should like to spend a whole 
 summer there with you." 
 
 " That would be delightful," she said, with- 
 out thinking of the interpretation that could 
 be put upon her words until she saw his tell- 
 tale face. 
 
 "Oh, why weren't you my brother?" she 
 broke out. 
 
 " I should n't like you at all for a sister." 
 
 " I don't wonder. I have failed lamentably 
 as a sister, but I should fail still worse as a 
 wife." 
 
 " Perhaps you would." 
 
 She felt chilled, and looked at Frank with 
 a slight contraction of the eyebrows. 
 
 " If I knew of any fellow who wanted to 
 marry you, I should warn him that he was by 
 no means sure of being happy with you." 
 
 " You would do well. I should give him the 
 same warning."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 269 
 
 "But I should add that the discipline he 
 would get would be excellent for his character. 
 Don't you think discipline is a very important 
 thing, Miss Davidson ? " 
 
 " Very," she assented, with a gay laugh. 
 What nonsense we are talking ! " she added 
 presently. 
 
 " ' You began it,' as the children say." 
 
 " Here is the finest view of all," she said, 
 a few minutes later, as she stopped before a 
 gap in the woods and seated herself on one of 
 the rude, unpainted benches that had been 
 thoughtfully placed at intervals along their 
 way. The forest made a frame of green 
 around the opening, which showed Lafayette 
 alone in its majesty and perfect symmetry : 
 the other mountains were hidden from view 
 behind the trees. Theodora made room for 
 Frank on the bench, and they looked at the 
 matchless picture for some moments in silence. 
 
 " Do you know you make me think of 
 Lafayette ? " he said at last. 
 
 " Why ? Because we are both ' hard and 
 cold ' ? " 
 
 " Because you are both so entirely self-suffi- 
 cient and so superior," he ventured.
 
 270 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Those are very disagreeable points of re- 
 semblance." 
 
 " You won't allow me to say anything agree- 
 able." 
 
 Theodora had a sense of exhilaration of 
 which she was thoroughly ashamed, for she 
 had always had a contempt for women who 
 took pleasure in the admiration of men. A 
 bright color glowed in her cheeks, and there 
 was a new softness in her blue eyes. 
 
 " I wonder if I should like you and Lafay- 
 ette just as well if you were not beautiful?" 
 he said presently. 
 
 " I, beautiful? Indeed, I am not beautiful ; 
 no one has ever thought so before. And you 
 must not say such things ; they are not ' in the 
 bond,' and they are very upsetting to my mind." 
 . " If that is the effect they have, I shall con- 
 tinue to say them ; if it gives you any pleasure 
 to know that I think you beautiful " 
 
 " It does n't. I mean it ought n't to give 
 me pleasure. It was very wrong of me to let 
 you stay here, and I shall send you home 
 to-morrow." 
 
 "To-morrow I have promised to take the 
 children on a picnic, and we shan't invite
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 271 
 
 you. Have you forgotten that I am here 
 chiefly to amuse them ? " 
 
 " No, but I thought you had forgotten it." 
 
 Later in the ascent, when it seemed as if 
 the summit of the mountain must be close 
 at hand, an old, weather-beaten, gray-bearded 
 workingman suddenly started out of the 
 ground, as it seemed, and warned them back. 
 
 " Don't come any nearer," he said ; " there 
 is going to be a blast." 
 
 " Are we safe where we are ? " Frank asked. 
 
 "Yes; I have never known the stones to 
 come so far." 
 
 They stood chatting with the old man for a 
 few minutes. At last, as they were beginning 
 to grow impatient, there was a loud explo- 
 sion. Frank seized Theodora and drew her to 
 one side, and a great piece of stone whizzed 
 by them and fell close to the spot where she 
 had stood. All three of them were breathless 
 and awestruck for a moment. 
 
 " I never knew it to come so far," the man 
 ejaculated at last. 
 
 " It might have killed me ! " said Theodora 
 under her breath. 
 
 She was suddenly confronted by the serious-
 
 272 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 ness, nay the awfulness of existence, and its 
 mystery. Had she been a few steps farther 
 to the left, her life would have been quenched 
 like the flame of a candle in the wind. Si- 
 lently she followed their guide up the steep, 
 short cut that led to the summit of the moun- 
 tain ; silently she climbed the staircase of the 
 observatory, and found herself in the treetops, 
 like a bird in its nest ; and silently she let her 
 eyes wander over those mysterious ranges of 
 mountains, one behind the other, which grew 
 dimmer and vaguer until they melted into the 
 horizon line. What a world of beauty it was ! 
 a world where it was so good to be, that the 
 thought of going to any other, unknown world 
 gave her a keen pang. For what purpose was 
 she here? she asked herself. And what was 
 the best use that she could make of her life ? 
 
 Frank respected her silence, and hardly 
 said a word to her all the way home ; and it 
 was not until he was bidding her good-by, 
 some days later, that he ventured to speak on 
 the subject that was nearest his heart. 
 
 " You have been very good to me," Theo- 
 dora said, as they parted, " and I shall never 
 fonret it."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 273 
 
 " Whatever you may decide, remember how 
 much I love you." 
 
 " I don't see why. I don't think I am the 
 sort of woman to be loved, or to make any 
 one happy." 
 
 " I can't tell you why. Or perhaps I could 
 in part ; I will some time, if you care to listen." 
 
 " I am abjectly ashamed of myself," she 
 exclaimed. " I ought to have given you a 
 positive answer. I thought I had, but the 
 more I see of you the harder it is for me to 
 let you go ; and yet I am sure that I don't love 
 you enough. Will you have patience with 
 me a little longer ? " 
 
 "I will have all the patience in the world. 
 I understand what you are feeling as well 
 as if I could see into your mind. If I were 
 different, you would decide quickly." 
 
 It was true, and it touched her to think 
 that he was so keenly in sympathy with her as 
 to take her part even against himself. 
 
 " I never knew any one so good as you are, 
 or so unselfish," she said warmly. 
 
 " I am neither the one nor the other." 
 
 She did not in the least realize the strain to 
 which she was submitting him by her indeci-
 
 274 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 sion. Perhaps it would have been impossible 
 for her to understand a temperament as emo- 
 tional as his, had he given free play to his 
 feelings, but he had succeeded in controlling 
 himself so well for her sake that she fre- 
 quently doubted whether he was deeply in 
 love with her. 
 
 Although she did not love him, it was aston- 
 ishing how blank the world seemed to her after 
 he had gone, and how eagerly she waited for 
 a possible letter. 
 
 He did not write to her, and when she first 
 reached Edgecomb he was still away on his 
 vacation. 
 
 The fact that she had not heard a word 
 from him since he bade her good-by made 
 the whole episode at Littleton seem unreal. 
 Should she try to make him happy ? she asked 
 herself over and over again. She was hon- 
 estly distrustful of her own powers. She 
 dreaded the care of Essie, and the idea of the 
 parish filled her with terror ; but on the other 
 hand, she longed to make him happy, and she 
 had a craving to be loved. What should she 
 do ? What was right, and what was wrong ?
 
 XX. 
 
 IT was a crisp September day when Theo- 
 dora reached Edgecomb. It was not without 
 a certain amount of nervousness that she pre- 
 pared to meet Marie. They could never have 
 any comfort in each other again, and she 
 herself was too sincere to affect a love which 
 she did not feel. Edward was unfeignedly 
 glad to see her ; and Marie, who looked so ill 
 that Theodora's heart softened towards her, 
 thanked her most warmly for her care of the 
 children. 
 
 " They were very good," Theodora said ; 
 " they did n't give me any trouble." 
 
 Marie colored at the recollection that these 
 words called up. She rose hastily, and, coming 
 over to Theodora, threw her arms impulsively 
 around her neck. " Dear, dear Theodora," 
 she cried, " I was very wicked and cruel. Will 
 you forgive me for saying all those dreadful 
 things? I was half out of my mind, for my 
 head was troubling me so."
 
 276 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 " Indeed I will forgive you," Theodora 
 answered warmly, " but it is I who ought to 
 ask to be forgiven for having unconsciously 
 caused you so much pain." 
 
 And yet both of these women knew, even 
 as they spoke, that nothing could ever be the 
 same between them again. 
 
 " We want you to stay here all winter," Ed- 
 ward said eagerly. " Marie and I have been 
 talking it over, and she is as anxious to have 
 you with us as I am." 
 
 Theodora saw Marie's forehead contract, 
 and she knew, as well as if she had spoken, 
 what was in her mind. 
 
 " It cannot be," she replied. " I am think- 
 ing of joining Rhoda Emerson in starting a 
 college settlement. She has St. Louis or Cin- 
 cinnati in her mind." 
 
 " At any rate you must stay with us as long 
 as you like," said Marie, and Theodora knew 
 that all was over. She thought she had tasted 
 the full bitterness of this knowledge before, 
 but as she wandered around the dear, familiar 
 rooms, where henceforth she was to be a 
 stranger and an alien, she felt a new and more 
 poignant sense of anguish in the thought that
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 277 
 
 here, where she so passionately longed to be, 
 she was not wanted. She would go away into 
 the great world, leaving her heart behind her ; 
 and they would settle comfortably back into 
 their slipshod methods of living, and say, when 
 they chanced to think of her, " Is n't it good to 
 be by ourselves again ? And is n't it lucky 
 that Theodora has found her mission at last 
 in looking after poor people by the wholesale, 
 instead of directing her energies against one 
 poor family?" 
 
 When she thought of Frank Compton, her 
 heart warmed ; but the more she thought of 
 him, the surer she was that she ought not to 
 yield to his entreaties. She felt that she had 
 been looking at him through a magnifying- 
 glass during those happy days at Littleton, for 
 since her return he had at once dwindled to 
 his usual proportions, so much more intense 
 was her feeling for her brother, and so much 
 keener was her grief at the prospect of the 
 impending parting from him. When she 
 had at last definitely made up her mind, she 
 felt that it would be easier to write her de- 
 termination to Frank than to see him face to 
 face :
 
 278 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 DEAR MR. COMPTON [her letter ran], 
 I cannot blame myself sufficiently for let- 
 ting you stay those five days in Littleton. My 
 only excuse is that I was so unhappy, and that 
 you were such a comfort to me, which is no ex- 
 cuse at all. Now that I am at home again, I 
 seem to be myself once more, and to see clearly. 
 I am certain that I could never make you 
 happy, and that in the knowledge of my failure 
 I should be unhappy myself. I should mean 
 to keep in the background, and to think only 
 of your wishes ; but to save my soul I could 
 not help interfering in a hundred ways, with 
 your management of Essie and in your care of 
 the parish, and you would be miserable in the 
 end. I am glad that I have made up my mind 
 before causing you any lasting pain. I expect 
 to go, very shortly, to help a friend start a 
 college settlement in the West, and I have no 
 doubt that I shall soon be absorbed by my 
 new work. 
 
 I must add that it has been a very great 
 happiness to me to have known you, and to 
 have won your good opinion. 
 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 THEODORA DAVIDSON.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 279 
 
 She read the letter over and felt that it was 
 too cold, but she did not know how to improve 
 it ; then she sealed it and sent it to the mail. 
 
 Frank Compton answered it in person. He 
 came to the house one afternoon when Edward 
 and Marie were away. It was a warm day, 
 and Theodora had taken her book out on 
 the side porch, where she sat trying 1 to fancy 
 herself in the mountains as she looked across 
 the level meadows to the river. He had 
 almost reached her before she was aware of 
 his presence. He looked so cheerful and well 
 satisfied that she said, " You did not get my 
 letter?" 
 
 " Yes, I did. That is why I am here. It 
 gave me a great deal of pleasure, that letter." 
 
 " Pleasure ? " 
 
 " Yes, for it told me that you did care for 
 me a little. If you had n't cared, you would 
 have written very differently." 
 
 " Mr. Compton ! " 
 
 " Miss Davidson ! " 
 
 "Don't try to change my determination. 
 My mind is made up." 
 
 "Theodora, in some ways you are delight- 
 fully young, in spite of your twenty-nine years.
 
 280 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 Did you seriously expect me to take your letter 
 as final? If so, you have a very limited ac- 
 quaintance with human nature. I, to give you 
 up for any such paltry reasons, when you could 
 love me ! " 
 
 " I never said I could." 
 
 The next hour was a very bewildering one 
 to Theodora ; before she knew what she was 
 admitting, before she half realized what she 
 was doing, she had been swept off her bear- 
 ings by the tide of his eloquence, and she had 
 promised What had she promised ? After 
 he left her, she sat in the fading twilight 
 trying to face the wonderful fact that she had 
 promised to marry him. It was all so strange, 
 so unexpected, and so overwhelming that she 
 could not grasp the situation. \Vhy4iad she 
 yielded against her better judgment? Did 
 she love him ? She hardly knew, but she was 
 sure at last, beyond the possibility of doubts 
 and misgivings, that he loved her. Was she 
 happy ? She could scarcely tell, but deep down 
 in her heart was a feeling of peace and content. 
 She sat there until the rosy glow had left the 
 sky and the world was only a dull gray once 
 more, and she was still sitting there when the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 281 
 
 harvest moon rose behind the gnarled apple- 
 trees. She absently watched a slight, childish 
 figure come along by the front of the house 
 and turn in at the gate, and with a start of 
 surprise she recognized Essie Compton. The- 
 odora rose to greet her prospective daughter. 
 
 " I am very glad to see you, Estelle," she 
 said. " Has your father told you " 
 
 " He told me that you had promised to 
 marry him, and I slipped away, before he knew 
 it, to say that I can't bear it ; I can't, oh, I 
 can't ! " 
 
 " My dear child ! " Theodora said gently, " I 
 am sorry that you do not like it, but it is too 
 late now for me to decide differently, for I 
 have given your father my promise." 
 
 Essie's face grew very white. " Why should 
 papa want to marry anybody ? " she demanded 
 fiercely. " He used to say that my mamma 
 was in heaven, but that she was just as inter- 
 ested in all that he and I were doing as if she 
 were here ; and when Aunt Charlotte said she 
 hoped he would marry again, he said he never 
 could. I can't bear it ; I can't! I can't ! " and 
 she stamped her foot and clenched her hands. 
 " How would you like it, if you were a little
 
 282 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 girl, and your dear papa was going to marry a 
 hateful woman ? " 
 
 The present world was for a moment blotted 
 out of Theodora's consciousness, and she was 
 once again a passionate girl of sixteen, trying 
 to prevent her father's marriage. The tortures 
 of jealousy that she had suffered, and the 
 lonely years in which she had grown hard and 
 bitter from being misunderstood, were vividly 
 before her. Could it be that this child was 
 feeling what she had felt ? Heaven forbid ! 
 
 " Come and sit on the steps," she said, " and 
 we will talk things over. You and I both 
 want to make your father happy. If he loves 
 me, it will make him happy to have me with 
 him. His heart is large enough to love us 
 both." 
 
 " He can't love me much if he likes you. 
 He said he thought it would be good for me 
 to have you take care of me, and I told him I 
 should die if you did." 
 
 " What did he say then ? " 
 
 " He said he loved you, and that you had 
 promised to be his wife, and that I must be a 
 good child and go to bed." 
 
 "Estelle"
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 283 
 
 " Don't call me Estelle ! " she flashed out. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " It was mamma's name." 
 
 *' Why did you never tell me before that 
 you did not like me to call you Estelle? " 
 
 " Because I was afraid of you." 
 
 " Why are you not afraid of me now ? " 
 
 " I can't stop to be afraid now. It is like a 
 battlefield." 
 
 " Poor child ! I am not really a person to 
 be afraid of, Essie. If you knew all about 
 me, if you could see into my heart, you would 
 not be afraid of me." 
 
 The child flung herself down on the door- 
 step, and sobbed as if her heart would break. 
 
 " Oh dear ! oh dear ! " she cried, "I wish I 
 were dead ! " 
 
 Theodora tried to stroke Essie's forehead, 
 but the little girl struck her outstretched hand. 
 
 " Essie, that is naughty ! you must try to 
 be a good child for your papa's sake." 
 
 " Oh dear, oh dear ! " she moaned. " Papa 
 does n't care about me any more." 
 
 Theodora knew so well what Essie was suf- 
 fering that it seemed almost as if it were her 
 younger self that was before her. She had a
 
 284 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 swift vision of her own future life shadowed by 
 the knowledge of this child's unhappiness. And 
 yet, might it not be possible to overcome her 
 dislike iu time? She was such a young child, 
 only eight years old I Alas ! incompatibility 
 of temperament takes no account of age, and 
 she felt certain that their mutual antagonism 
 would but grow more intense under the friction 
 of daily life. She could measure the child's 
 capacity for jealousy by her own, and she 
 asked herself if any woman had the right 
 to cause such pain. When she was a girl she 
 felt sure she had not, and she must not let 
 her judgment be clouded by her present feel- 
 ings. For more than half an hour Essie 
 stayed with her, first begging her piteously 
 not to marry her papa, and then crying and 
 moaning, and all the time Theodora's heart 
 was pierced by the keen knowledge of the 
 child's sufferings. 
 
 " I can't bear this any longer," she said at 
 last. " Essie, it is getting late, and your papa 
 will be worried if he finds that you are not at 
 home. Wait a minute ; it is so late that I 
 must get Michael to go home with you." 
 
 " And you think perhaps you won't marry 
 papa? ; ' the child asked.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 285 
 
 O Essie, Essie ! you are only a little 
 child, and it seems as if your first grief would 
 break your heart. Suppose your papa married 
 again, and you were very unhappy, and there 
 was nobody to love you very much for years 
 and years and years ; and then suppose a man 
 like your papa told you that he loved you, and 
 you were longing to be loved, woidd it be easy 
 for you to give him up ? Think of me as well 
 as of yourself. Do you imagine it would be 
 an easy thing for me to give up your papa ? " 
 
 The little girl could not follow all this, 
 but she vaguely felt that Miss Davidson was 
 weakening in her determination. " You can't 
 love my papa very much," she observed, " for 
 you have only known him a little while, and I 
 have known him all my life. I am sure he 
 would be very unhappy if you came to live with 
 us, for I was n't happy when I lived with you ; 
 and I heard Aunt Marie say that you would 
 make any man wretched, and that she prayed 
 Heaven you would not marry papa, for he was 
 so unselfish that you would ride right over 
 him." 
 
 Theodora's face darkened. " Did Mrs. Da- 
 vidson tell you that? " she asked.
 
 286 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " No ; I heard her say so to Uncle Ned when 
 they did n't remember that I was in the next 
 room." 
 
 " And that is why you do not want me to 
 marry your father?" 
 
 " Oh, no. It is because I hate you so ! " 
 she answered, with the cold-blooded truthful- 
 ness of childhood. "Miss Davidson, won't 
 you please marry some one else ? If you were 
 to go away, I think papa would be just as he 
 used to be." 
 
 " Is he different now ? " 
 
 *' Yes ; he seems to be thinking about some- 
 thing else, and to have forgotten mamma. 
 Will you please promise not to marry him ? " 
 
 " Essie, I will promise you this much. I 
 will not marry your father now, as he wants 
 me to do. I will take six months to think 
 about it, and perhaps, if you feel just as 
 strongly as you do now at the end of that time, 
 perhaps I will not marry him." 
 
 After the child had gone, Theodora went 
 up to her own room and closed the blinds to 
 shut out the moonlight. She knew that she 
 must decide now, once for all, and that there 
 could be no question of six months. If she
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 287 
 
 were to break with Francis Compton, it must 
 be done at once ; she could never have the 
 strength to do it if she were to see him famil- 
 iarly day after day. Only two days ago, of 
 her own free will, she had done what this child 
 entrea'ted her to do, she had refused to marry 
 him, for many reasons that had seemed to her 
 wise. The reasons against the marriage were 
 far more urgent than she had supposed, and 
 yet now it seemed well-nigh impossible to give 
 him up. Why ? Simply because she had had 
 one hour of exquisite happiness. She knew, 
 now that it was too late, how well she could 
 have loved him. For a moment she half 
 tremulously and breathlessly thought of what 
 it would mean to have her daily life wrapped 
 about with such tenderness as his. For a mo- 
 ment she wondered if to be the wife of a ser- 
 vant among men would not be a happier fate 
 than to be the wife of a king among them. 
 All her old standards and judgments were 
 swept away like ice melted in the warm sun- 
 shine of spring. Then she resolutely turned 
 her thoughts another way, for she knew, as 
 well as if she had already given Francis 
 Compton up, that the deed must be done;
 
 288 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 and, with her characteristic promptness of 
 action, she wrote a hasty note reversing all 
 that she had said in the afternoon. 
 
 Marie and Edward looked at her furtively 
 as she took her place at the breakfast-table 
 the next morning. It was evident that they 
 had heard something from Frank. She must 
 undeceive them as quickly as possible. 
 
 After their somewhat preoccupied meal was 
 over, Edward opened the studio door, and, 
 taking Theodora by the arm, led her into the 
 room. 
 
 " Dear old Theo," he said, " I am awfully 
 glad. Frank has told me." 
 
 " There is nothing to be glad about, Ed- 
 ward," she said drearily. " Frank should not 
 have told you anything. There is nothing to 
 tell, except that I am going to start a college 
 settlement with Rhoda Emerson." 
 
 " But, Theo ! " he gasped, " Frank said"- 
 
 " It is all a mistake ; I am sure I could not 
 make him happy." 
 
 " My dear girl, he does n't seem to agree 
 with you there. Theo, do you mean to say 
 that you are going to let a chance like this 
 slip ? Do you think it is a bigger future to
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 289 
 
 live in the slums, and take care of a lot of 
 people who will wish you in Jericho, than to 
 make a fellow like Frank Compton happy? 
 You ought to go down on your knees and 
 thank the Lord for your good fortune." 
 
 " If I were to marry him I should make his 
 child miserable, and I know what that means 
 so well that I should be miserable myself." 
 
 " I have heard of marriages being prevented 
 because the stern parent objected," Edward 
 remarked afterwards to his wife, " but I have 
 never before heard of one that was given up 
 out of deference to the stern child. Great 
 Scott ! what are we coming to, if we allow 
 ourselves to be governed so abjectly by young 
 America ? " 
 
 " I am very glad it has been broken off," 
 said Marie, "for I am sure she would have 
 made him wretched." 
 
 " Well, one thing is certain : she will make 
 him wretched if she breaks it off; but she 
 won't, she can't. No man who wanted her 
 would be fool enough to let her go when he 
 was so near getting her." 
 
 It chanced that Francis Compton was of
 
 290 THE COMING OF THEODOEA. 
 
 Edward's opinion, and at an early hour he 
 appeared, leading his little girl by the hand, 
 and demanding to see Theodora in a voice 
 which made the mocking words die on Ed- 
 ward's tongue, and 'sent him hastily into the 
 garden in search of her. Frank and Essie 
 followed him. 
 
 Theodora was picking the few hardy flowers 
 that had outlived the frost of an earlier period 
 to blossom in this Indian summer. There was 
 a bench at the end of the garden that over- 
 looked the tennis court, and two garden chairs, 
 into one of which Theodora sank. Frank 
 seated himself on the bench, and Essie nestled 
 close up to him, taking his hand between her 
 two. 
 
 "Theodora," Frank began unsteadily, "you 
 can hardly expect me to take what you wrote 
 seriously?" 
 
 Theodora looked down at the brilliant sal- 
 vias and geraniums in her lap. " I do," she 
 said simply. " You could not have supposed 
 that I would write like that if I were not in 
 earnest ? " 
 
 " You wrote like that once before when you 
 were not in earnest."
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 291 
 
 " I was in earnest then, and it was weak 
 of me to allow you to persuade me against 
 my better judgment. I have known all along 
 that what you want never ought to be, except 
 in that one interval of temporary insanity. I 
 should probably have been a terrible disap- 
 pointment to you, even if there were no ques- 
 tion of your child, yet I would have risked 
 that ; but, with her dislike to contend with, it 
 would be impossible to make you happy." 
 
 " I have brought my little girl here this 
 morning on purpose that she may tell you she 
 is sorry she was so unreasonable last night." 
 He looked down at the child as he spoke. 
 She remained obstinately silent. " Essie," he 
 said gently, "remember what you promised 
 me." 
 
 " Miss Davidson," she began sullenly, " I 
 will try to be a good girl." 
 
 " Look at her eyes. She may say one thing 
 with her lips, because she loves you so much 
 that she will promise anything you ask, but 
 her eyes cannot tell a falsehood. She cannot 
 help hating me, and violently objecting to this 
 marriage. You once told me that I ought to 
 be more sympathetic," she added in a lower
 
 292 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 tone. " How can I, when I think of my own 
 miserable girlhood, help having the most in- 
 tense sympathy with this poor little crea- 
 ture?" 
 
 " Run away, Essie," her father said ; " you 
 can go into the house and play with the chil- 
 dren." 
 
 " Theodora, you are exasperatingly conscien- 
 tious ! " he exclaimed, as soon as Essie had 
 departed. " You talk of sympathy, but you 
 have no power of sympathizing unless you have 
 been in a similar position. Put yourself in 
 my place," he continued vehemently. " Fancy 
 having passed years of hopelessness, and then 
 discovering that there was possible happiness 
 for you, and then imagine being tortured with 
 suspense for weeks, and at last fancy your- 
 self at last made so happy that you hardly 
 dared to think of what life might be, and then 
 imagine being told that it was all at an 
 end, simply for a morbid scruple. How would 
 you feel, if you were a man who was hungry 
 for love and happiness ? " 
 
 " I don't know," Theodora said in a low 
 voice. 
 
 " Theodora, do you suppose I am going
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 293 
 
 calmly to give you up now that I find you 
 could love me ? " he asked impetuously. 
 
 " Yes, for we have no right to be happy at 
 your child's expense. She is a part of your 
 past, before you knew me, and she has her 
 claim before me." 
 
 " Theodora, you will drive me mad by your 
 talk of duty. Is it right to promise to marry 
 a man, and then take back your promise for 
 no fault of his ? Is it right to spoil the lives 
 of two people for the sake of an unreasonable 
 child ? You do not love me as I love you, or 
 you could not do it." 
 
 Theodora turned pale. She looked down 
 once more at the scarlet flowers in her lap. 
 At last she raised her eyes. " I suppose I do 
 not love you as well as you love me," she said 
 unsteadily, " for then I could not see so clearly. 
 But I love you enough to make this very hard ; 
 yet it is right, I am sure it is right, and when 
 I know a thing is right I never change." 
 
 " You are always so dead sure that you are 
 right," he cried despairingly. " Can't you see 
 that there is another side to this question? 
 I am just as certain that I am right." 
 
 He poured out his love for her in incoher-
 
 294 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 ent sentences, and she listened to his eager 
 pleadings with outward calm, while her mind 
 was in a tumult of conflicting emotions. She 
 had never been so stirred and melted before. 
 
 " Oh," she exclaimed at last, " why did you 
 ever love me ? I feel as if I were to blame." 
 
 " You need n't feel that, dear. Whatever 
 happens, you need n't feel that. It was all so 
 gradual and inevitable. I did not realize it 
 for a long time, and all at once Do you 
 remember that afternoon when I met you as 
 you were going home, and you told me about 
 Marie ? " 
 
 She bowed her head. 
 
 " And I told you that, if I allowed a per- 
 sonal bias to govern me, I should decide in 
 favor of you ? Do you remember ? " 
 
 " I do." 
 
 " When I said that, you looked at me, and 
 the whole world changed ! It was as if I had 
 never seen your real self before. You had 
 looked at me before as if I were a chance ac- 
 quaintance, but you looked at me then as if 
 you really cared for me a little, and you were 
 so beautiful ! " 
 
 Meanwhile a small figure in red was coming
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 295 
 
 nearer and nearer, for Essie was growing im- 
 patient at the long delay, but they were both 
 too absorbed to hear her approach. 
 
 Theodora covered her face with her hands. 
 " I wish I had not looked at you like that. 
 I did not know it. You must forgive me if I 
 have ever tried to make you like me. I did 
 not suppose then that you could love again." 
 
 " I know it, dear. I did not suppose so 
 either." 
 
 There was a brief silence, and then a shrill 
 voice asked, " Do you love her as well as you 
 loved mamma ? " 
 
 Theodora and Frank both started. They 
 turned, and saw the child standing behind 
 them with flashing eyes. Frank looked away 
 from his daughter towards Theodora. " Yes," 
 he said with emotion, " I love her quite as 
 much, but in a different way. I loved Estelle 
 with a boy's first passion, and I love you, 
 Theodora, with a man's whole strength." 
 
 The color rushed into Essie's face. " You 
 ought not to love her as well as you loved 
 mamma ! " she cried passionately. " I wish 
 mamma were here now, and then you could n't 
 marry Miss Davidson ! "
 
 296 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Essie, you need n't feel troubled, I am not 
 going to marry your father." 
 
 "Theodora" 
 
 " Please don't say anything more," she en- 
 treated, " I cannot bear it. I know that your 
 judgment is blinded by your feeling for me, 
 and so I have to decide for both of us, for 
 your fate and that of your child are in the 
 balance. Do you suppose that we could 
 either of us be happy with the knowledge 
 that we had made a little girl miserable ? " 
 
 "Theodora, you take it all as so final. 
 Essie would love you, she could not help lov- 
 ing you, when she had made up her mind to 
 this marriage." 
 
 "Look at her, now, and see if you think 
 it probable. If people once dislike me, it is 
 final. And how could I love her ? We are 
 antagonistic at every point. I know from 
 experience that it is hell on earth to live in 
 the house with some one who dislikes you, if 
 you are conscious of that dislike, and I would 
 rather earn my bread by sweeping the streets. 
 Think of all the long, wearing days that a 
 woman and a child who are uncongenial have 
 to live through together at home, while the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 297 
 
 man they love goes out into the world. You 
 are too sensitively strung to be oblivious to 
 the daily friction there would be, and it would 
 make you wretched to feel that we were both 
 unhappy." 
 
 " Theodora " - 
 
 "Nothing you say will make any difference," 
 she said firmly ; " I shall not change." 
 
 " But the conditions may change. Essie 
 may grow to feel differently." 
 
 " Can't you see that all the willingness in 
 the world on Essie's side and mine to make 
 the best of things cannot really alter the con- 
 ditions? We cannot change our natures." 
 She was silent a moment ; then she raised her 
 eyes and looked at him steadily. " If I ever 
 succeed in making anything of my life," she 
 said tremulously, " it will be because I have 
 known you. When you came to me in the 
 mountains, I had lost all faith in myself. I 
 can never tell you how much good you have 
 done me. I shall be better and happier all 
 my life for having known you. And now 
 good-by ! Don't say another word," she added 
 imperiously ; " that is the only thing you can 
 do for me."
 
 298 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " Theodora, you have me completely in your 
 power. I cannot force you to marry me, but 
 there is one thing that I will say, and that is 
 that I shall never give you up. You cannot 
 prevent my thinking of you, and living for 
 you, and planning for a time when you will 
 feel differently. You have a very strong will, 
 but with all your strength you cannot prevent 
 that."
 
 XXI. 
 
 THEODORA went to the West and joined 
 her friend in starting a college settlement. 
 She threw herself into her work with all her 
 old enthusiasm and energy, and with greater 
 powers of sympathy than she had ever carried 
 into her teaching, and a distrust of her abso- 
 lute infallibility that sometimes saved her 
 from making mistakes ; yet she could not 
 change her nature, and so, through lack of 
 comprehension, she did some harm, but she 
 did more good. Edward, by means of dictat- 
 ing to Frank, became her constant correspond- 
 ent; but save for these weekly letters, her 
 connection with the past was wholly severed. 
 
 Marie and Edward were more content in 
 their freedom regained than they had been 
 when Theodora was with them, but something 
 of the fine aroma of their happiness had de- 
 parted. Edward missed the devotion of his sis- 
 ter, and he sometimes felt the want of her prac- 
 tical supervision of the household, although 
 
 J
 
 300 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 he scarcely owned this fact even to himself. 
 Marie did not miss her, but her conscience 
 was not quite at ease, and, now that Theodora 
 was at a distance, she could do justice to the 
 strength and nobility of her character, and 
 overlook the faults that made her so irritating 
 in every-day life. There finally came a time 
 when she hoped that her sister-in-law would 
 return and take up her abode in the parsonage, 
 and indeed Theodora at the other end of the 
 village would be quite a different thing from 
 Theodora under one's own roof. 
 
 The terra-cotta wall-paper on the studio is 
 still a dream, for there never seems to be a con- 
 venient moment for making the change. Marie 
 is too busy with her painting and her house- 
 hold cares to accomplish it, and Edward is 
 Edward. The studio, however, has returned 
 to its normal state of picturesque disorder, 
 and its owners are, if possible, a more charm- 
 ing and genial host and hostess than they were 
 in the days of its prim perfection. Edgecomb 
 wonders, indeed, why it is that Mrs. Davidson 
 looks so young and fresh, now that she is left 
 to fight with her domestic problems single- 
 handed.
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 301 
 
 " How you must miss Theodora ! " even such 
 an intelligent friend as Mrs. Shiinmin observes, 
 while Marie smiles and keeps her own counsel. 
 
 The gayety and serenity for which she was 
 always noted have returned, and people find 
 Mrs. Davidson more attractive than ever. 
 
 It was in the early summer that Edward 
 wrote his first letter to his sister with his own 
 hand, a poor, scrawling, cramped chirography 
 that was touchingly different from the distin- 
 guished handwriting that had once been his : 
 
 DEAR OLD THEO [the letter ran], I want 
 to tell you myself, what I am sure you will 
 be glad to hear, that we have a little boy, 
 born just twenty-four hours ago, and that both 
 mother and child are doing well. I think it 
 will please you to know that Marie, of her 
 own accord, has suggested naming the baby 
 Nathaniel Bradlee. So you see, my dear, 
 that the life of the general may be finished 
 by his namesake. 
 
 Both Marie and I wish, dear Theodora, 
 that you would come and spend the summer 
 with us. Is there no vacation from the slums ? 
 Will not the poor be glad to have a little
 
 302 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 rest and go to the deuce in their own way 
 for two months ? To quote a hymn, " I need 
 thee every hour." Or is it a hymn ? My 
 knowledge of such matters is rather shaky. If 
 I were only dictating to old Frank, now, he 
 would set me straight, for he knows them all. 
 Poor fellow ! His life is neither a very happy 
 nor a very easy one, but so long as he does n't 
 live in the slums you can't be expected to 
 trouble your head about him. I am afraid, 
 however, that he has n't given up troubling his 
 head about you, and I believe he still thinks 
 you have it in your power to make him di- 
 vinely happy. Is n't it singular how long some 
 people will cherish their illusions ? His small 
 daughter is as rampageous as ever. I am 
 thankful, when I see her, for my many bless- 
 ings, thankful, I mean, that a good deal of 
 natural depravity is scattered about equally 
 through four no, I must learn to say five 
 now, instead of being concentrated in one. 
 
 Do come to us for a couple of months, my 
 love, and give us a mental and moral house- 
 cleaning, which I am sure ought to be an an- 
 nual institution. And now, having quoted a 
 hymn, if it is a hymn, I will close with the
 
 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 303 
 
 words of St. Paul : " See how long a letter I 
 have written to you with my own hand." Per- 
 haps I have n't got that quotation straight, 
 but you won't know it if I have n't ! 
 With love from Marie and the five, 
 Your ever attached brother, 
 
 EDWARD DAVIDSON. 
 Be sure to come, we all want to see you. 
 
 Marie and Edward awaited an answer to 
 this letter with much impatience. He was all 
 eagerness to have Theodora spend the summer 
 with them, and she, after a struggle, had 
 reached that point of magnanimity where she 
 was willing to have her make them a long 
 visit because he wanted it. The answer was 
 brought to them one afternoon when Edward 
 was sitting with Marie and the little Nathan- 
 iel. His mother took a joy which she felt 
 to be unholy in having this small morsel of 
 humanity quite to herself, and yet she could 
 not help thinking how proud his aunt would 
 be of him. 
 
 Edward tore open the letter and read it 
 hastily. 
 
 " What does she say, Ned ? " Marie asked.
 
 304 THE COMING OF THEODORA. 
 
 " She says she cannot possibly leave the 
 college settlement this summer, but that some 
 time another summer, she hopes she will 
 join us at the seashore, or in the mountains, 
 for she wants so much to see us all." 
 
 " But if she does n't come to Edgecomb, she 
 won't see Frank Compton. Does she say any- 
 thing about him ? " 
 
 " Yes. She says, ' That chapter is fin- 
 ished.' "
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. 
 
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