The End of a Coil

"I don't think she really knows much of what is in the Bible," Mrs. Eberstein said. "She has never read it much."

"I don't think she knows about Jesus," Dolly went on gravely; "for she never told me; and she would if she had known, I think. Aunt Harriet, I think I ought to tell her now."

"What would you tell her, my darling?"

"Oh, I will tell her that I know Him and love Him; and I will tell her I have got a Bible, and some of the things I have found in it. I will ask her to get one too, and read it. I don't believe she knows."

"The reason why a great many people do not know, Dolly, is, as your Aunt Harry says, that they are so much taken up with other things."

"Then I think one ought to take care not to be too much taken up with other things," said Dolly very seriously.

"But you have got to be taken up with other things," Mr. Eberstein went on. "Here you are going to school in a few days; then your head will be full of English and French, and your hands full of piano keys and harp strings, from morning till night. How are you going to do?"

Dolly looked at the speaker, came and placed herself on his knee again, and laid a hand on his shoulder; eyeing him steadily.

"Ought I not to go to school?"

"Must! – else you cannot be the right sort of a woman, and do the right sort of work."

"How then, Uncle Edward? what shall I do?"

"I'll tell you one thing, Dolly. Don't study and practise to get ahead of somebody else; but to please the King!"

"The King – that is Jesus?"

"Certainly."

Dolly nodded, in full agreement with the rule of action as thus stated; presently brought forward another idea.

"Will He care? Would it please Him to have me play on the piano, or learn French and arithmetic?"

"Dolly, the more you know, and the better you know it, the better servant you can be; you will have the more to use for Jesus."

"Can I use such things for Him? How?"

"Many ways. He will show you how. Do you think an ignorant woman could do as much in the world as an elegant, well-informed, accomplished woman?"

Dolly thought over this question, nodded as one who had come to an understanding of it, and went back to her knitting.

"What ever will become of that child," said Mrs. Eberstein an hour or two later, when she and her husband were alone. "I am full of anxiety about her."

"Then you are taking upon you the part of Providence."

"No, but, Edward, Dolly will have a history."

"So have we all," Mr. Eberstein responded very unresponsively.

"But she will not have a common history. Do you see how open she is to receive impressions, and how fast they stay once they are made?"

"I see the first quality. I never saw a creature quicker to take impressions or to welcome affections. Whether they will prove as lasting as they are sudden, – that we have no means of knowing at present."

"I think they will."

"That's a woman's conclusion, founded on her wishes."

"It is a man's conclusion too; for you think the same thing, Edward."

"Don't prove anything, Harry."

"Yes, it does. When two people come to the same independent view of something, it is fair to suppose there are grounds for it."

"I hope so. Time will show."

"But, Edward, with this extremely sensitive and affectionate nature, how important it is that Dolly should have only the right surroundings, and see only the right sort of people."

"Just so. And so she is going out into the world of a large school; where she will meet all sorts of people and be subjected to all sorts of influences; and you cannot shield her."

"I wish I could keep her at home, and have her taught here! I wish I could!"

"Playing Providence again. We all like to do it."

"No, but, Edward, just look at her," said Mrs. Eberstein with her eyes full of tears.

"I do," said Mr. Eberstein. "I've got eyes. But you will have to trust her, Harry."

"Now she will go, I have no doubt, and write that letter to her mother. I wonder if Sally will get scared, and take her away from us?"

"Why, Hal," said her husband, "your self-will is getting up very strong to-night! What if? Dolly's future does not depend upon us; though we will do what we can for it."

What they did then, was to pray about it again; for these people believed in prayer.

The next day Mrs. Eberstein had invited an acquaintance to come to dinner. This acquaintance had a daughter, also about to enter Mrs. Delancy's school; and Mrs. Eberstein's object was to let the two girls become a little known to each other, so that Dolly in the new world she was about to enter might not feel everything utterly strange. Mrs. Thayer belonged to a good New York family; and it likewise suited her purposes to have her daughter received in so unexceptionable a house as Mrs. Eberstein's, albeit the young lady was not without other Philadelphia friends. So the party fitted together very harmoniously. Mrs. Thayer, in spite of her good connections, was no more than a commonplace personage. Christina, her daughter, on the other hand, showed tokens of becoming a great beauty. A little older than Dolly, of larger build and more flesh and blood development generally, and with one of those peach-blossom complexions which for fairness and delicacy almost rival the flower. Her hair was pretty, her features also pretty, her expression placid. Mrs. Eberstein was much struck.

"They are just about of an age," remarked Mrs. Thayer. "I suppose they will study the same things. Everybody studies the same things. Well, I hope you'll be friends and not rivals, my dears."

"Dolly will not be rivals with anybody," returned Dolly's aunt.

"She don't look very strong. I should think it would not do for her to study too hard," said the other lady. "Oh, rivalry is necessary, you know, to bring out the spirit of boys and girls and make them work. It may be friendly rivalry; but if they were not rivals they would not be anything; might as well not be school girls, or school boys. They would not do any work but what they liked, and we know what that would amount to. I don't know about beating learning into boys; some people say that is the way; but with girls you can't take that way; and all you have to fall back upon is emulation."

"Very few young people will study for the love of it," Mrs. Eberstein so far assented.

"They might, I believe, if the right way was taken," Mr. Eberstein remarked.

"Emulation will do it, if a girl has any spirit," said Mrs. Thayer.

"What sort of spirit?"

"What sort of spirit! Why, the spirit not to let themselves be outdone; to stand as high as anybody, and higher; be No. 1, and carry off the first honours. A spirited girl don't like to be No. 2. Christina will never be No. 2."