Jewel: A Chapter in Her Life Part 49

Jewel drew her on with an embracing arm, and they descended the steps and walked down the path.

Suddenly the child stopped. "Doesn't it seem unkind to go without Anna Belle!" she exclaimed.

"Oh, nonsense," returned Eloise, smiling. "You're not going way upstairs to get her. We needn't tell her we went. She's been out driving all the morning. I think it's my turn."

The child looked happily up into her cousin's face. "I love to see you laugh, cousin Eloise," she returned, and they strolled on.

The park drives were deserted. The cousins reached the gorge without meeting any one. Leaning upon the slender fence, they gazed down into the green depths, and for a minute listened to the woodland melody.

"Isn't it just like your Spring Song?" asked the child at last.

"It is sweet and comforting and good," replied the girl slowly, a far-off look in her eyes.

Jewel lifted her shoulders. "Don't you want to get down there, cousin Eloise?" she asked, her eyes sparkling.

"Yes," replied the girl promptly.

"Will it hurt your dress?" added Jewel, with a sudden memory of Mrs.

Forbes, as she looked over her cousin's immaculate black and white costume.

"I guess not," laughed the girl. "Are you afraid Mrs. Forbes will put me to bed?"

She bent her lithe figure and was under the wire in a twinkling. Jewel crept gleefully after her, but was careful to hold her little skirts out of harm's way as they climbed down the steep bank and at last rested among the ferns by the brook. Its louder babble seemed to welcome them.

Nature had been busy at her miracle working since the child's last visit. Without moving she could have gathered a handful of little blossoms. Instead, she rolled over and kissed a near clump of violets.

"You darling, darling things!" she said.

Eloise looked up through far boughs to the fleece-flecked sky.

"Everything worth living for is right here, Jewel," she said. "Let's have a tent and not give any one our address."

"I think we ought to let Dr. Ballard come, don't you?"

"Now why did you pick him out?" returned Eloise plaintively. She was resting her head against her clasped hands as she stretched herself against the incline of her verdant couch. Her companion did not reply at once, and Eloise lazily turned her head to where she could view the eyes fixed upon her.

"What are you thinking of, Jewel?"

"I was just thinking that if my mother made you a thin green dress that swept around you all long and narrow, you'd look like a flower, too."

The girl smiled back at the sky. "That's very nice. You can think those thoughts all you please."

"That wasn't all, though, because I was thinking about Dr. Ballard.

He feels sorry. I couldn't tell you about it at lunch, because aunt Madge--well, because--"

"Yes," returned Eloise quietly. "It is better for us to be alone."

Jewel's brow relaxed. "Yes," she said contentedly, "in the Ravine of Happiness."

"Look out, though," continued the girl in the same quiet tone and looking back at the sky. "Look out what you say here. It is easy now to feel that all is harmonious, and that discords do not exist. I think even if grandfather appeared I could talk with him peacefully."

"I have thought about it," returned the child, "and it seems hard to know what to say; but I love you and Dr. Ballard both, so it will be sure to come out right. He feels sorry if you are beginning to like to study Christian Science."

"Really, did he speak of that to you? I think he might have chosen a man of his size."

"Of course he spoke of it when he found out I wanted to ask you to take me to our church."

"Where is the church here?" Eloise abandoned her lazy tone.

"They have a hall. Mr. Reeves wrote it down for me. Do you really care, cousin Eloise? You've been so kind and helped me, but do you really begin to care?"

"Care? Who could help caring, if it is true? I've been reading some of the tales of cures in your magazine. If those people tell the truth"--

"Why, cousin Eloise!" The child's shocked eyes recalled the girl's self-centred thoughts.

"I beg your pardon, dear. It was rude to say that. I'm not ill, Jewel.

I'm so well and strong that--I've sometimes wished I wasn't, but life turned petty and disgusting to me. I resented everything. It is just as wonderful and radiant a star of hope to read that there is a sure way out of my tangle as if I had consumption and was promised a cure of that. I don't yet exactly believe it, but I don't disbelieve it. All I know is I want to read, read, read all the time. I was just thinking a minute ago that if we had the books here it would be perfect. This is the sort of place where it would be easiest to see that only the good is the real, and that the unsubstantiality of everything evil can be proved."

Jewel gave her head a little shake. "Just think of poor Dr. Ballard being afraid to have you believe that."

"But who wouldn't be afraid to believe it, who wouldn't!" exclaimed the girl vehemently.

"Why, I've always known it, cousin Eloise," returned the child simply.

"You dear baby. You haven't lived long. I don't want to climb into a fool's paradise only to fall out with a dull thud."

Jewel looked at her, grasping as well as she could her meaning. "I know I'm only a little girl; but if you should go to church with me," she said, "you'd see a lot of grown-up people who know it's true. Then we could go on Wednesday evenings and hear them tell what Christian Science has done for them."

"Oh, I'm sure I shouldn't like that," responded Eloise quickly. "How can they bear to tell!"

"They don't think it's right not to. There are lots of other people besides you that are sorry and need to learn the truth."

The rebuke was so innocent and, withal, so direct, that honest Eloise turned toward Jewel and made an impulsive grasp toward her, capturing nothing but the edge of the child's dress, which she held firmly.

"You're right, Jewel. I'm a selfish, thin-skinned creature," she declared.

The little girl shook her head. "You've got to stop thinking you are, you know," she answered. "You have to know that the error Eloise isn't you."

"That's mortal mind, I suppose," returned Eloise, smiling at the sound of the phrase.

"I should think it was! Old thing! Always trying to cheat us!" said Jewel. "All that you have to do is to remember every minute that G.o.d's child must be manifested. He inherits every good and perfect thing, and has dominion over every belief of everything else."

Eloise stared at her in wonder. "Do you know what you've talking about, you little thing, when you use all those long words?"

"Yes. Don't you?" asked the child. "Oh, listen!" for a bird suddenly poured a wild strain of melody from the treetop.

"And just think," said Jewel presently, in a soft, awestruck tone, "that some people wear birds sewed on their hats, just as if they were glad something was dead!"

"It _is_ weird," agreed Eloise. "I never liked it. Jewel, did Dr.

Ballard blame you because I am interested in Christian Science?"