"I'm a trifle dazzled myself. Bates has tapped a new
cellar somewhere. I'm afraid I'm not a good housekeeper,
to speak truthfully. There are times when I
hate the house; when it seems wholly ridiculous, the
whim of an eccentric old man; and then again I'm actually
afraid that I like its seclusion."
"Your seclusion is better than mine. You know my
little two-room affair behind the chapel,-only a few,
books and a punching bag. That chapel also is one of
your grandfather's whims. He provided that all the
offices of the church must be said there daily or the
endowment is stopped. Mr. Glenarm lived in the past,
or liked to think he did. I suppose you know-or maybe
you don't know-how I came to have this appointment?"
"Indeed, I should like to know."
We had reached the soup, and Bates was changing
our plates with his accustomed light hand.
"It was my name that did the business,-Paul. A
bishop had recommended a man whose given name was
Ethelbert,-a decent enough name and one that you
might imagine would appeal to Mr. Glenarm; but he
rejected him because the name might too easily be cut
down to Ethel, a name which, he said, was very distasteful
to him."
"That is characteristic. The dear old gentleman!" I
exclaimed with real feeling.
"But he reckoned without his host," Stoddard continued.
"The young ladies, I have lately learned, call
me Pauline, as a mark of regard or otherwise,-probably
otherwise. I give two lectures a week on church
history, and I fear my course isn't popular."
"But it is something, on the other hand, to be in touch
with such an institution. They are a very sightly company,
those girls. I enjoy watching them across the
garden wall. And I had a closer view of them at the
station this morning, when you ran off and deserted
me."
He laughed,-his big wholesome cheering laugh.
"I take good care not to see much of them socially."
"Afraid of the eternal feminine?"
"Yes, I suppose I am. I'm preparing to go into a
Brotherhood, as you probably don't know. And girls
are distracting."
I glanced at my companion with a new inquiry and
interest.
"I didn't know," I said.
"Yes; I'm spending my year in studies that I may
never have a chance for hereafter. I'm going into an
order whose members work hard."
He spoke as though he were planning a summer outing.
I had not sat at meat with a clergyman since the
death of my parents broke up our old home in Vermont,
and my attitude toward the cloth was, I fear, one of
antagonism dating from those days.
"Well, I saw Pickering after all," I remarked.
"Yes, I saw him, too. What is it in his case, genius
or good luck?"