Carolina Lee

"I may not know you completely, Colonel Yancey, but I know you well enough to believe that part of your statement implicitly. But you will never win her either by force or by coercion of any kind. Give her a free hand and let her come to you of her own accord, or she will not come at all."

By the expression which flitted across the colonel's slightly cruel face at Mr. Howard's words, he was convinced of one thing, and that was that the man was honestly and deeply in love with Carolina. This fact illuminated the matter somewhat.

"It would be quite true with horses," mused Colonel Yancey. "And a blooded horse and a spirited woman have many points in common."

"I freely confess to you that I wish to purchase Guildford in order to let Carolina go down there and work her will with the place. The girl has courage, good business ideas; she is a friend of my daughter's, and I am interested in the development of her character. I would just as soon leave you to make the same arrangement with her which I propose to make, if she would consent to have money transactions with you, but she will not. For what reason you and she probably know. I confess that I do not, but what you have just been good enough to tell me concerning your feelings toward her would seem to throw light upon the situation. Now, may I make a suggestion?"

"A thousand, if you will!"

"Thank you. Now, possibly an outsider may be able to give you a new point of view. Suppose you yield to Carolina's wishes, sell me the place, and thus give her the opportunity to carry out her dead father's plans. You thus provide her with a cherished life-work. You know the Lees. They are proud and grateful. To whom would her heart naturally turn? To an old married man like me, through her friendship for my daughter, or to a comparatively young man like yourself, in whose children she is as vitally interested as she must have been to heal your baby girl?"

Now Mr. Howard was deliberately playing upon the man's feelings, but he was not prepared for the change in Colonel Yancey's face.

"Did she do that?" he said, in a hoarse voice, "Did she do it?"

"Certainly she did. Who else?"

"They told me that Mrs. Goddard did it-Sister Sue told me."

"No, it is considered by the Christian Scientists-this new sect which you may have heard that Carolina has joined-that Gladys is her first case of healing. Carolina is Mrs. Goddard's pupil, and doubtless Mrs. Goddard helped her, – in the curious way they have, for I overheard Carolina telephoning Mrs. Goddard to treat her-Carolina-for fear, in your little daughter's case. I believe they heal by confidence in God's promises and the theory that mind controls matter. Wonderful, isn't it?"

"Wonderful, indeed, but the most wonderful part of it to me is that Miss Carolina was induced to render me this inestimable benefit when she-well, she used to hate me, to be quite frank. If you knew the rebuffs I have taken at her hands!"

"Well, that is one of the results of this new religion of hers. It is founded on love, and they are obliged to live it, or they fail to receive any benefits. It is a self-acting religion, and is its own detective. They regard hatred, for example, as a disease, and naturally Carolina could not, in their code, be healed herself or heal others as long as she hated you. Thus, in healing your little girl, she was working out her own salvation."

"Mr. Howard," said Colonel Yancey, with his face working painfully, "you don't know what it is to have a crippled child. You don't know the agony I have endured, looking at her beautifully formed little body and into her dear face, with its intelligent eyes, broad brow, and sweet mouth, and then realizing that all her life she must be helpless, unable to walk or even to stand, a burden to herself and others. Her feet, as perhaps you know, were perfect in shape and form. They were simply turned inward. I have gone through Gethsemane itself wondering when her tender little heart would learn its first taste of bitterness against the parents who brought her into the world to suffer so. And then to have all this load of grief lifted, to see my baby walk about and play with her little sister, and frolic as other children do, and suddenly to learn that I owe it to the woman who is my all in life-I assure you, sir, it is almost more than my heart can bear. Take Guildford on your own terms, sir! It is a small return!"

Mr. Howard held out his hand, and Colonel Yancey grasped it.

"The human heart is a curious thing, Mr. Howard. I was as determined five minutes ago as ever a man was on earth to let you plead until you lost your breath, yet I would never part with my hold on Miss Carolina through owning Guildford. Now, in the twinkling of an eye, I am ready to let you have it. I can't give it to you quickly enough. What price are you willing to pay?"

"Suppose we say the face of the mortgage, – just what it cost you?"

"Ten thousand dollars less, if you say so, Mr. Howard."

"No, I prefer to let you show your gratitude to her in some other way. I will pay what you paid."

"Good! I will have the deed made out to-day. But lose no time in telling her that Guildford is hers. She has won it for herself."

"If I tell her that, do you know what she will say?" asked Mr. Howard.

"No, what?"

"She will give all the credit to her new thought. She told me before I started that I would be successful. As she puts it, 'Nothing is ever lost in Truth.'"

"Then she considers, even though Guildford has been in my power for several years, that it was never really lost to her?"

"In her new conception of the truth, that is the way she argues."

"By Jove, Mr. Howard, I'm going to join them! I wonder if she would let me go to church with her next Sunday?"

"I'm sure she would."

But, as he turned away, Mr. Howard shook his head and said to himself: "Carolina will have to tell him what she told Noel, – of the futility of attempting to be a Scientist for the sake of the loaves and fishes."

But, indeed, Carolina had not only believed it, but, with her Bible and "Science and Health" on her knees, during the hour of the interview she had made her demonstration, so that she knew it without words. She felt it by the uplift in her own heart and the nearness of her own soul to the Infinite, so that, when Mr. Howard appeared with a beaming face to tell her, the radiance on Carolina's admonished him that she knew already.

"But you don't know all, young lady! After I had left his office, the colonel came post-haste after me to say that his sister and the children are to leave to-morrow for Whitehall, his brother-in-law's estate, which lies some twelve miles from Guildford, but northeast from Enterprise, the little station, where you leave the railroad, and Miss Yancey is going to call on you and Mrs. Winchester this evening, to invite you to make Whitehall your headquarters until you can establish yourself elsewhere."

"Oh, how kind of them!" said Carolina.

"Then y-you will accept?" demanded Kate, in old-thought surprise.

"Why, what could possibly be better?" asked Carolina, in new-thought simplicity and gratitude.

"T-ten to one on Colonel Yancey!" murmured Kate in her father's ear as they turned away.

"W-was it a d-difficult job, d-daddy?" she asked, tucking her arm into his.

"Kate, child, it was an absolute triumph for Carolina's new religion. I deserve no credit. The man set his jaws and looked as hard as nails, until I mentioned that Carolina had healed his baby. He had been carefully led-probably by Carolina's instructions-to believe that Mrs. Goddard did it-"

"Y-yes, Miss Yancey believes it, too."

"Well, they forgot to coach me, so I told him it was Carolina. My dear, voilà tout!"

"C-Christian Science p-plays ball every time, doesn't it?" observed Kate, thoughtfully.

CHAPTER XII

WHITEHALL

"Well," said Mrs. Winchester, looking out of the car-window as the train approached Enterprise, "if any man had told me that two years from the day we left Bombay I should find myself going back to Guildford to live, I should have said he was a thousand dollars from the truth. What are you laughing at, Carolina?"

"And if any man had told me that I could ever have brought myself to accept an invitation from Miss Sue Yancey to visit them at Whitehall until we could establish ourselves comfortably, when I used to dislike her brother so much, I should have said the same," said Carolina, "but love works many miracles in the human heart."

Mrs. Winchester looked sharply at the young girl, but Carolina's expression was so innocent Cousin Lois decided that she was not referring to Colonel Yancey. Then, with one of her rare caresses, which Mrs. Winchester prized above gold, Carolina laid her hand on Mrs. Winchester's arm and said:

"And, dear Cousin Lois, no mother could have been sweeter and more unselfish about the loss of her money than you have been, or more self-sacrificing to come down here with me."

"Nonsense, my dear!" said Mrs. Winchester, colouring like a girl of eighteen. Her blush was still beautiful and was her only comfort, except her waist-line. "You know that I love to be where you are. In fact, Carolina, if you knew how I suffered, actually suffered, child, last winter in Boston, when I was separated from you, you would believe me when I say that I cannot live without you. I must be with you. You are all I have in the world, – and the money, – what is money good for except to buy things with? Haven't I everything I want?"

Carolina listened with a beating heart.

"Yet, you are even going to have the money back!" she said, with another pressure of Cousin Lois's hand.

"Yes, I really believe I am. That new religion of yours seems to be a sort of magic carpet, to take you anywhere you want to go and to get you everything you want to have."

"It brings perfect harmony into your life," said Carolina.