"Mrs. Marx," said the poor young man, leaving the lichens, "they bother me to death!"

"Ah? How is that?"

"Always watching, and hanging around, and giving a fellow no chance for his life, and putting in their word. They call themselves very wise, but I think it is the other thing."

"They don't approve, then?"

"I don't want to marry money!" cried Tom; "and I don't care for fashionable girls. I'm tired of 'em. Lois is worth the whole lot. Such absurd stuff! And she is handsomer than any girl that was in town last winter."

"They want a fashionable girl," said Mrs. Marx calmly.

"Well, you see," said Tom, "they live for that. If an angel was to come down from heaven, they would say her dress wasn't cut right, and they wouldn't ask her to dinner!"

"I don't suppose they'd know how to talk to her either, if they did,"

said Mrs. Marx. "It would be uncomfortable--for them; I don't suppose an angel can be uncomfortable. But Lois ain't an angel. I guess you'd better give it up, Mr. Caruthers."

Tom turned towards her a dismayed kind of look, but did not speak.

"You see," Mrs. Marx went on, "things haven't gone very far. Lois is all right; and you'll come back to life again. A fish that swims in fresh water couldn't go along very well with one that lives in the salt. That's how I look at it. Lois is one sort, and you're another. I don't know but both sorts are good; but they are different, and you can't make 'em alike."

"I would never want her to be different!" burst out Tom.

"Well, you see, she ain't your sort exactly," Mrs. Marx added, but not as if she were depressed by the consideration. "And then, Lois is religious."

"You don't think that is a difficulty? Mrs. Marx, I am not a religious man myself; at least I have never made any profession; but I a.s.sure you I have a great respect for religion."

"That is what folks say of something a great way off, and that they don't want to come nearer."

"My mother and sister are members of the church; and I should like my wife to be, too."

"Why?"

"I told you, I have a great respect for religion; and I believe in it especially for women."

"I don't see why what's good for them shouldn't be good for you."

"That need be no hindrance," Tom urged.

"Well, I don' know. I guess Lois would think it was. And maybe you would think it was, too,--come to find out. I guess you'd better let things be, Mr. Caruthers."

Tom looked very gloomy. "You think she would not have me?" he repeated.

"I think you will get over it," said Mrs. Marx, rising. "And I think you had better find somebody that will suit your mother and sister."

And after that time, it may be said, Mrs. Marx was as careful of Lois on the one side as Mrs. and Miss Caruthers were of Tom on the other.

Two or three more days pa.s.sed away.

"How _is_ Mrs. Wishart?" Miss Julia asked one afternoon.

"First-rate," answered Mrs. Marx. "She's sittin' up. She'll be off and away before you know it."

"Will you stay, Mrs. Marx, to help in the care of her, till she is able to move?"

"Came for nothin' else."

"Then I do not see, mother, what good we can do by remaining longer.

Could we, Mrs. Marx?"

"Nothin', but lose your chance o' somethin' better, I should say."

"Tom, do you want to do any more fishing? Aren't you ready to go?"

"Whenever you like," said Tom gloomily.

CHAPTER XVII.

TOM'S DECISION.

The Caruthers family took their departure from Appledore.

"Well, we have had to fight for it, but we have saved Tom," Julia remarked to Mr. Lenox, standing by the guards and looking back at the Islands as the steamer bore them away.

"Saved!--"

"Yes!" she said decidedly,--"we have saved him."

"It's a responsibility," said the gentleman, shrugging his shoulders.

"I am not clear that you have not 'saved' Tom from a better thing than he'll ever find again."

"Perhaps _you'd_ like her!" said Miss Julia sharply. "How ridiculous all you men are about a pretty face!"

The remaining days of her stay in Appledore Lois roved about to her heart's content. And yet I will not say that her enjoyment of rocks and waves was just what it had been at her first arrival. The island seemed empty, somehow. Appledore is lovely in September and October; and Lois sat on the rocks and watched the play of the waves, and delighted herself in the changing colours of sea, and sky, and clouds, and gathered wild-flowers, and picked up sh.e.l.ls; but there was somehow very present to her the vision of a fair, kindly, handsome face, and eyes that sought hers eagerly, and hands that were ready gladly with any little service that there was room to render. She was no longer troubled by a group of people d.o.g.g.i.ng her footsteps; and she found now that there had been, however inopportune, a little excitement in that.

It was very well they were gone, she acknowledged; for Mr. Caruthers _might_ have come to like her too well, and that would have been inconvenient; and yet it is so pleasant to be liked! Upon the sober humdrum of Lois's every day home life, Tom Caruthers was like a bit of brilliant embroidery; and we know how involuntarily the eyes seek out such a spot of colour, and how they return to it. Yes, life at home was exceedingly pleasant, but it was a picture in grey; this was a dash of blue and gold. It had better be grey, Lois said to herself; life is not glitter. And yet, a little bit of glitter on the greys and browns is so delightful. Well, it was gone. There was small hope now that anything so brilliant would ever illuminate her quiet course again. Lois sat on the rocks and looked at the sea, and thought about it. If they, Tom and his friends, had not come to Appledore at all, her visit would have been most delightful; nay, it had been most delightful, whether or no; but--this and her New York experience had given Lois a new standard by which to measure life and men. From one point of view, it is true, the new lost in comparison with the old. Tom and his people were not "religious." They knew nothing of what made her own life so sweet; they had not her prospects or joys in looking on towards the far future, nor her strength and security in view of the trials and vicissitudes of earth and time. She had the best of it; as she joyfully confessed to herself, seeing the glorious breaking waves and watching the play of light on them, and recalling Cowper's words--

"My Father made them all!"

But there remained another aspect of the matter which raised other feelings in the girl's mind. The difference in education. Those people could speak French, and Mr. Caruthers could speak Spanish, and Mr.

Lenox spoke German. Whether well or ill, Lois did not know; but in any case, how many doors, in literature and in life, stood open to them; which were closed and locked doors to her! And we all know, that ever since Bluebeard's time--I might go back further, and say, ever since Eve's time--Eve's daughters have been unable to stand before a closed door without the wish to open it. The impulse, partly for good, partly for evil, is incontestable. Lois fairly longed to know what Tom and his sister knew in the fields of learning. And there were other fields.