"You don't mean," protested Arthur Townshend, "that you are going back to church again?"
"Alas! yes—Have some toast, won't you?—Father has his Bible class, and I teach a class in the Sabbath school. Buff, pass Mr. Townshend the butter."
"Thank you. But, tell me, do you walk all the way again?"
"Every step," said Elizabeth firmly. "We could get an electric car, but we prefer to trudge it."
"But why?"
"Oh! just to make it more difficult."
Elizabeth smiled benignly on the puzzled guest. "You see," she explained, "Father is on the Sabbath Observance Committee, and it wouldn't look well if his daughter ruffled it on Sabbath-breaking cars. Isn't that so, Father?"
Mr. Seton shook his head at his daughter, but did not trouble to reply; and Elizabeth went on:
"It's more difficult than you would think to be a minister's family. The main point is that you must never do anything that will hurt your father's 'usefulness,' and it is astonishing how many things tend to do that—dressing too well, going to the play, laughing when a sober face would be more suitable, making flippant remarks—their name is legion. Besides, try as one may, it is impossible always to avoid being a stumbling-block. There are little ones so prone to stumble that they would take a toss over anything."
"That will do, Elizabeth," said Mr. Seton.
"Sorry, Father." She turned in explanation to Mr. Townshend. "When Father thinks I am flippant and silly he says 'Elizabeth!' and his eyes twinkle; but when I become irreverent—I am apt to be often—he says 'That will do,' and I stop. So now you will understand. To change the subject—perhaps the most terrible experience I have had, as yet, in my ministerial career was being invited to a christening party and having to sit down in a small kitchen to a supper of tripe and kola. Alan says the outside edge was reached with him when a man who picked his ears with a pencil asked him if he were saved."
"Elizabeth," said her father, "you talk a great deal of nonsense."
"I do," agreed Elizabeth; "I'm what's known as vivacious—in other words, 'a nice bright girl.' And the funny thing is it's a thing I simply hate being. I admire enormously strong, still people. Won't it be awful if I go on being vivacious when I'm fifty? Or do you think I'll be arch then? There is something so resuscitated about vivacious spinsters." She looked gaily round the table, as if the dread future did not daunt her greatly.
Ellen had removed the plates and was handing round the pudding. Elizabeth begged Mr. Townshend not to hurry, and to heed in no way the scrambling table manners of his host and hostess. She turned a deaf ear to his suggestion that he would like to hear her instruct her class, assuring him that he would be much better employed reading a book by the fire. Buff, she added, would be pleased to keep him company after he had learned his Sabbath evening task, eight lines of a psalm.
"Aw," said Buff. "Must I, Father?"
"Eight lines are easily learned, my son."
"Well, can I choose my own psalm?"
His father said "Certainly"; but Elizabeth warned him: "Then make him promise to learn a new one, or he'll just come with 'That man hath perfect blessedness.'"
"I won't," said Buff. "I know a nice one to learn: quite new, about a worm."
"Dear me," said his father, "I wonder what psalm that is? Well, Lizbeth, we must go. You'll find books in the drawing-room, Mr. Townshend; and see that the fire is good."
Elizabeth's class consisted of seven little bullet-headed boys. To-night there was an extra one, whom she welcomed warmly—Bob Scott, the small boy whom she had befriended while collecting in the rain. She found, however, that his presence was not conducive to good conduct in the class. Instead of lapping up the information served out to him without comment as the other boys did, he made remarks and asked searching questions. Incidents in the Bible lesson recalled to him events, generally quite irrelevant, which he insisted on relating. For instance, the calling forth of evil spirits from the possessed reminded him of the case of a friend of his, one Simpson, a baker, who one morning had gone mad and danced on the bakehouse roof, singing, "Ma sweetheart hes blue eyes," until he fell through a skylight, with disastrous results.
Bob's manners, too, lacked polish. He attracted Elizabeth's attention by saying "Hey, wumman!" he contradicted her flatly several times; but in spite of it all, she liked his impudent, pinched little face, and at the end of the hour kept him behind the other boys to ask how things were going with him. He had no mother, it seemed, and no brothers or sisters: he went to school (except when he "plunk't"), ran messages for shops, and kept house—such keeping as it got. His father, he said, was an extra fine man, except when he was drunk.
Before they parted it was arranged that Bob should visit the Seton's on Saturday and get his dinner; he said it would not be much out of his way, as he generally spent his Saturday mornings having a shot at "fitba'" in the park near. He betrayed no gratitude for the invitation, merely saying "S'long, then," as he walked away.
On Sabbath evenings the Setons had prayers at eight o'clock, and Buff stayed up for the event. Marget and Ellen were also present, and Elizabeth played the hymns and led the singing.
"First," said Mr. Seton, "we'll have Buff's psalm."
Buff was standing on one leg, with his ill-used Bible bent back in his hand, learning furiously.
"Are you ready?" asked his father.
Buff took a last look, then handed the Bible to his father.
"It's not a psalm," he said; "it's a paraphrase."
He took a long breath, and in a curious chant, accentuating such words as he thought fit, he recited:
"Next, from the deep, th' Almighty King Did vital beings frame; Fowls of the air of ev'ry wing, And fish of every name. To all the various brutal tribes He gave their wondrous birth; At once the lion and the worm Sprung from the teeming earth."
He only required to be prompted once, and when he had finished he drew from his pocket a paper which he handed to his father.
"What's this?" said Mr. Seton. "Ah, I see." He put his hand up to his mouth and appeared to study the paper intently.
"It's not my best," said Buff modestly.
"May I see it?" asked Elizabeth.
Buff was fond of illustrating the Bible, and this was his idea of the Creation so far as a sheet of note-paper and rather a blunt pencil could take him. In the background rose a range of mountains on the slopes of which a bird, some beetles, and an elephant (all more or less of one size) had a precarious foot-hold. In the foreground a dishevelled lion glared at a worm which reared itself on end in a surprised way. Underneath was printed "At once the lion and the worm"—the quotation stopped for lack of space.
"Very fine, Buff," said Elizabeth, smiling widely. "Show it to Mr. Townshend."
"He's seen it," said Buff. "He helped me with the lion's legs, but I did all the rest myself—didn't I?" he appealed to the guest.
"You did, old man. We'll colour it to-morrow, when I get you that paint-box."
"Yes," said Buff, crossing the room to show his picture to Marget and Ellen, while Mr. Seton handed Arthur Townshend a hymn-book and asked what hymn he would like sung, adding that everyone chose a favourite hymn at Sabbath evening prayers. Seeing Arthur much at a loss, Elizabeth came to his help with the remark that English hymn-books were different from Scots ones, and suggesting "Lead, kindly Light," as being common to both.
Marget demanded "Not all the blood of beasts," while Ellen murmured that her favourite was "Sometimes a light surprises."
"Now, Buff," said his father.
"Prophet Daniel,"