"I hope you don't mean Maria to be a home missionary?" said Ida.

"She might go to school for a worse purpose," replied Harry, simply.

"Maria has a very strong character from her mother, if not from her father. I actually think the chances are that the Mann girl will have a better chance of getting good from Maria than Maria evil from her."

"Well, dear, suppose we leave it to Maria herself," said Ida. "n.o.body is going to force the dear child away against her will, of course."

"Very well," said Harry. His face still retained a slightly sulky, disturbed expression.

Ida, after a furtive glance at him, took up a sheet of the Sunday paper, and began swaying back and forth gracefully in her rocking-chair, as she read it.

"How foolish all this sentiment about that murderer in the Tombs is,"

said she presently. "They are actually going to give him a Christmas-tree."

"He is only a boy," said Harry absently.

"I know that--but the idea!"

Just then Maria pa.s.sed the window, dragging little Evelyn in her white sledge. Ida rose with a motion of unusual quickness for her, but Harry stopped her as she was about to leave the room.

"Don't go out, Ida," he said, with a peremptoriness which sat strangely upon him.

Ida stared at him. "Why, why not?" she asked. "I wanted to take Evelyn out. You know Josephine is not here."

"She is getting out all right with Maria's help; sit down, Ida," said Harry, still with that tone of command which was so foreign to him.

Ida hesitated a second, then she sat down. She realized the grace and policy of yielding in a minor point, when she had a large one in view. Then, too, she was in reality rather vulnerable to a sudden attack, for a moment, although she was always as a rule sure of ultimate victory. She was at a loss, moreover, to comprehend Harry's manner, which was easily enough understood. He wished to be the first to ascertain Maria's sentiments with regard to going away to school.

Without admitting it even to himself, he distrusted his wife's methods and entire frankness.

Presently Maria entered, leading little Evelyn, who was unusually st.u.r.dy on her legs for her age. She walked quite steadily, with an occasional little hop and skip of exuberant childhood.

She could talk a little, in disconnected sentences, with fascinating mistakes in the sounds of letters, but she preferred a gurgle of laughter when she was pleased, and a wail of woe when things went wrong. She was still in the limbos of primitivism. She was young with the babyhood of the world. To-day she danced up to her father with her little thrill of laughter, at once as meaningless and as full of meaning as the trill of a canary. She pursed up her little lips for a kiss, she flung frantic arms of adoration around his neck. She clung to him, when he lifted her, with all her little embracing limbs; she pressed her lovely, cool, rosy cheek against his, and laughed again.

"Now go and kiss mamma," said Harry.

But the baby resisted with a little, petulant murmur when he tried to set her down. She still clung to him. Harry whispered in her ear.

"Go and kiss mamma, darling."

But Evelyn shook her head emphatically against his face. Maria, almost as radiant in her youth as the child, stood behind her. She glanced uneasily at Ida. She held the white fur robes and wraps which she had brought in from the sledge.

"Take those things out and let Emma put them away, dear," Ida said to her. She smiled, but her voice still retained its involuntary harshness.

Maria obeyed with an uneasy glance at little Evelyn. She knew that her step-mother was angry because the baby would not kiss her. When she was out in the dining-room, giving the fluffy white things to the maid, she heard a shriek, half of grief, half of angry dissent, from the baby. She immediately ran back into the parlor. Ida was removing the child's outer garments, smiling as ever, and with seeming gentleness, but Maria had a conviction that her touch on the tender flesh of the child was as the touch of steel. Little Evelyn struggled to get to her sister when she saw her, but Ida held her firmly.

"Stand still, darling," she said. It was inconceivable how she could say darling without the loving inflection which alone gave the word its full meaning.

"Stand still and let mamma take off baby's things," said Harry, and there was no lack of affectionate cadences in his voice. He privately thought that he himself could have taken off the child's wraps better than his wife, but he recognized her rights in the matter. Harry remembering his first wife, with her child, was in a state of constant bewilderment at the sight of his second with hers. He had always had the masculine opinion that women, in certain primeval respects, were cut on one pattern, and his opinion was being rudely shaken.

"Call Emma, please," said Ida to Maria, and Maria obeyed.

When the maid came in, Ida directed her to take the child up-stairs and put on another frock.

Maria was about to follow, but Harry stopped her. "Maria," said he.

Maria stopped, and eyed her father with surprise.

"Maria," said Harry, bluntly, "your mother and I have been talking about your going away to school."

Maria turned slightly pale and continued to stare at him, but she said nothing.

"She thinks, and I don't know but she is right," said Harry, with painful loyalty, "that your a.s.sociates here are not just the proper ones for you, and that it would be much better for you to go to boarding-school."

"How much would it cost?" asked Maria, in a dazed voice. The question sounded like her own mother.

"Father can manage that; you need not trouble yourself about that,"

replied Harry, hurriedly.

"Where?" said Maria, then.

"To a nice school where your mother was educated."

"My mother?"

"Ida--to Wellbridge Hall."

"How often should I come home and see you and Evelyn? Every week?"

"I am afraid not, dear," said Harry, uneasily.

"How long are the terms?" asked Maria.

"Only about twelve weeks," said Ida.

Maria stood staring from one to the other. Her face had turned deadly pale, and had, moreover, taken on an expression of despair and isolation. Somehow, although the little girl was only a few feet from the others, she had a look as if she were leagues off, as if she were outside something vital, which removed her, in fact, to immeasurable distances. And, in fact, Maria had a feeling which never afterwards wholly left her, of being outside the love of life in which she had hitherto dwelt with confidence.

"Maybe you would like it, dear," Harry said, feebly.

"I will go," Maria said, in a choking voice. Then she turned without another word and went out of the room, up-stairs to her own little chamber. When there she sat down beside the window. She did not think. She did not seem to feel her hands and feet. It was as if she had fallen from a height. The realization that her father and his new wife wanted to send her away, that she was not wanted in her home, stunned her.

But in a moment the door was flung open and her father entered. He knelt down beside Maria and pulled her head to his shoulder and kissed her, and she felt with a sort of dull wonder his face damp against her own.

"Father's little girl!" said Harry. "Father's own little girl!

Father's blessing! Did she think he wanted to send her away? I rather guess he didn't. How would father get along without his own precious baby, when he came home at night. She shan't go one step. She needn't fret a bit about it."

Maria turned and regarded him with a frozen look still on her face.

"It was She that wanted me to go?" she said, interrogatively.

"She thought maybe it would be best for you, darling," said Harry.