Katherine's Sheaves Part 23

She did observe, however, that Jennie paid the strictest attention throughout the service, joining in the Lord's Prayer, and in the hymns with a vigor which indicated thorough enjoyment of that portion of it.

The moment the benediction was p.r.o.nounced she came directly to her and greeted her with a half-deprecatory air, but with a roguish gleam in her saucy eyes.

Katherine lingered a little to speak to some acquaintances, and also introduced her companion; then they pa.s.sed out of the hall together.

"Did you have Prof. Seabrook's permission to come here this morning, Jennie?" Katherine inquired, when they were on the street, but feeling confident of receiving a negative reply.

Jennie took refuge in one of her comical grimaces and shrugged her plump shoulders.

"Ask me no questions and I will tell you no--stories," she laughingly rejoined.

"I am answered," Katherine gravely observed.

"I don't care. I wanted to come, and I knew it wouldn't do to ask the professor, after what he said to you about Christian Science,"

said the girl, in self-justification, but flus.h.i.+ng consciously beneath the look of disapproval in her companion's eyes. "I think the service was just lovely," she went on, glibly. "How happy all those people seemed--as if there wasn't a thing in the world to trouble them. And that 'silent prayer'!--it just made me think of Elijah and the 'still small voice,' after the tempest and the earthquake. I was sorry when it was over."

"I am glad you enjoyed the services, Jennie. They are always very restful to me, and Sunday is my day to be marked with a 'white stone' for that reason," and there was a look of peace in the soft, brown eyes that a.s.sured Jennie of the truth of her words.

"Oh, I think Sunday is a bore, as a rule," she observed, with another shrug. "I'm always lonesome if I don't go to church, and, if I do, I never know 'where I am at'--as the Irishman put it-- after listening to a long sermon. That was a queer idea, though, in the lesson to-day, about there being only one Mind in the universe. Where do you get your authority for that, Miss Minturn?"

"There is but one G.o.d, who is Spirit or Mind, and He is omnipresent," Katherine explained.

"What are you going to do with us, then? I mean your mind and mine?"

"This mortal mind is only a counterfeit--"

"A counterfeit of what?"

"Of the One Mind, or the divine intelligence. The same as gas and electric light are counterfeits of real light from the sun, or the one source of light; but, oh, dear! I am talking Science, Jennie, and Prof. Seabrook said I must not," said Katherine, cutting herself short.

"The idea of trying to bridle anyone's tongue, in any such way, in this free country!" cried Jennie, aggressively. "But that lady read from the Bible that there is 'nothing covered that shall not be revealed, neither hid that shall not be made known'; then the man read something about it being a law of G.o.d for truth to uncover error. Do you believe that, Miss Minturn?"

"Yes."

"Do you Scientists really know how to find out anything that is hidden or--or secret?" eagerly inquired the girl.

"I think I don't quite catch your meaning, Jennie."

"I'll tell you why I asked you that," she replied, an intense look in her dark eyes, her cheeks flus.h.i.+ng crimson. "Perhaps you have heard something about me--that--that I am a kind of waif?"

"Yes, I have, dear," Katherine admitted.

"Well, it is true, and I'll tell you all about it," was the confidential rejoinder. "My aunt--she taught me to call her so, though she isn't related to me in any way--was traveling from Kansas City to Chicago, about sixteen years ago, and there was a terrible accident. Auntie was in a rear car and wasn't hurt in the least, but the first and second sleepers were completely wrecked.

A good many people were killed, and others so badly injured they didn't live long. As soon as auntie could pull herself together she went out to see if she could help anybody, and she found me, a little tot only a year old, screaming in the gutter beside the track. She took me back into her car and looked me over, to see if I was injured; but, aside from a few bruises and scratches, I appeared to be all right, and, after a while, she quieted and soothed me to sleep. Then she went out again to try to learn to whom I belonged; but she could not get the slightest clew, and everyone said the person or persons I was with must have been among the killed. She advertised, and the railroad officials made every effort to find my friends for a long time; but nothing ever came of it. Auntie began to grow fond of me, and said she would never let me go until she had to give me up to my own folks. Of course, they have never been found, and so I grew up with her."

"But wasn't there anything about you by which you could be identified?" inquired Katherine, who had been deeply interested in the pathetic story.

"Nothing but a string of amber beads with a queer gold clasp, and with the initials 'A. A. to M. A. J.' engraved on the back of it.

Now, do you think that Christian Science could solve such a riddle as that?" demanded the girl, in conclusion.

Katherine smiled faintly.

"There is nothing of clairvoyance in Christian Science, dear, and that is a hard question to explain to you," she said. "I mean difficult to answer so that you would clearly understand me. But it is sufficient for every human need, and very wonderful things have been demonstrated through the right comprehension of it. I know of men who govern their business by it, and who have solved some very perplexing problems. But I am talking again!" she exclaimed, and breaking off suddenly once more.

"Oh, if I could only find out who I am, I'd be a Christian Scientist, or--anything else!" cried Jennie, with tears in her eyes, but gritting her teeth to keep the drops from falling. "It is dreadful to feel yourself to be such an enigma! Think of it! to have your ident.i.ty lost. I get awfully worked up over it sometimes. Auntie is a dear, and I love her with all my heart, for she has been an angel of goodness to me. She isn't very well off, but she wanted me to have a first-cla.s.s education and be with nice girls; so, after talking with Prof. Seabrook, she said if I would be willing to work for a part of the expense she would try to make up the rest."

"How perfectly lovely of Miss Wild!" said Katherine, earnestly.

"And you, too, Jennie, deserve great credit for your own efforts to get a good education. But--"

"But what?"

"I wonder if I may say it?" mused Katherine, doubtfully.

Jennie slipped her hand within Katherine's arm and gave it a fond little hug.

"Miss Minturn, I've loved you ever since the day you came to Hilton. You are a dear--you have been just as kind as you could be to me, and you may say anything you like," she impulsively returned.

"Thank you; that is giving me a good deal of license," was the laughing response; "but what I wanted to say was--make the getting of your education, instead of fun, your chief object, and don't spoil your record by breaking rules."

"As I have to-day, for instance?" supplemented Jennie, flus.h.i.+ng.

"Yes, to-day, and--on some other occasions that I could mention."

The girl gave vent to a hearty, rollicking laugh.

"You manage to see considerable with those innocent eyes of yours," she said, after a moment. "But I don't get very much fun after all. With all my work and my studies there is precious little time left me for recreation, and, sometimes, I get so full I just have to kick over the traces. But--surely you don't think I could get any harm from your service to-day," she concluded, demurely.

"That is not the point, Miss Mischief, and you know it. Of course, there was nothing but good in the service for you, or anyone. But you didn't find anything in it--did you?--to countenance disobedience?"

"No," said Jennie, seriously; "and I suppose, too, that if any of the teachers or girls had seen me come away from the hall with you it might have given the impression that you had countenanced my going. But, Miss Minturn, I have wanted to get at the secret of-- of your dearness, ever since you came here. But I promise you, though, I will not put you in jeopardy again by running away to your church."

Katherine nodded her approval at this a.s.surance, then changed the subject, and they chatted pleasantly until they reached the seminary.

After dinner Katherine repaired, as she had been requested, to Miss Reynolds' room. She found her teacher sitting at her desk, her Bible and "Science and Health" open before her.

"You see, I cannot let the great subject alone," she said, welcoming the girl with a smile and glancing at her books. "Now that I have begun to get a glimpse of the truth, it is like a fountain of pure, cold water to a man peris.h.i.+ng from thirst--I cannot get enough of it; I just want to immerse myself in it. And, see here," she added, touching a letter lying beside the books, "I have written to the publis.h.i.+ng house in Boston for several of Mrs.

Eddy's works. I want them for my very own."

"You are surely making progress," Katherine returned, with s.h.i.+ning eyes.

She was very happy, for this eager, radiant woman seemed an entirely different being from the helpless sufferer to whom she had been called less than forty-eight hours previous.

"Sit down, Kathie," said her teacher, indicating a chair near her.

"I hope I am making progress," she added, growing suddenly grave.

"I find there is need enough of it, and I have been both on the mount and into the valley to-day."

"That is the experience of everyone," was the smiling reply, "but it all means progress just the same."

"I see that everyone who begins to get a glimpse of the truth, in Christian Science, must also begin to live it at once, if he is honest."