Sunny Slopes | Page 7

at other women's babies and visiting orphans' homes to see if she can find one she wants to adopt, because she hasn't one of her own. Always that sorrow behind the twinkle in her eyes! If she hadn't married, she wouldn't want a baby. Take Larkie and Jim. Always Larkie was healthy at home, strong, and full of life. But since little Violet came, Lark is pale and weak, and has no strength at all. Aunt Grace is staying with her now. Why, I can't look at dear old Larkie without half crying.
"Take even you, my precious Carol, perfectly happy, oh, of course, but all your originality, your uniqueness, the very you-ness of you, will be absorbed in a round of missionary meetings, and prayer-meetings, and choir practises, and Sunday-school classes. The hard routine, my dear, will take the sparkle from you, and give you a sweet, but un-Carol-like precision and method. Oh, yes, you are happy, but thank you, dear, I think I'll keep my Self and do my work, and--be an old maid.
"Mr. Orchard offers himself as an alternative to the roars every now and then, and I expound this philosophy of mine in answer. He shouts with laughter at it. He says it is so, so like a baby in business. He reminds me of the time when gray hairs and crow's-feet will mar my serenity, and when solitary old age will take the lightness from my step. But I've never noticed that husbands have a way of banishing gray hairs and crow's-feet and feeble knees, have you? Babies are nice, of course, but I think I'll baby myself a little.
"I do get so homesick for the good old parsonage days, and all the bunch, and-- Still, it is nice to be a baby in business, and think how wonderful it will be when I graduate from my baby-hood, and have brains enough to write books, big books, good books, for all the world to read.
"Lovingly as always,
"Baby Con."
When Carol read that letter she cried, and rubbed her face against her husband's shoulder,--regardless of the dollar powder on his black coat.
"A teeny bit for father," she explained, "for all his girls are gone. And a little bit for Fairy, but she has Gene. And quite a lot for Larkie, but she has Jim and Violet." And then, clasping her arm about his shoulders, which, despite her teasing remonstrance, he allowed to droop a little, she cried exultantly: "But not one bit for me, for I have you, and Connie is a poor, poverty-stricken, wretched little waif, with nothing in the world worth having, only she doesn't know it yet."
CHAPTER IV
A WOMAN IN THE CHURCH
And there was a woman in the church.
There always is,--one who stands apart, distinct, different,--in the community but not with it, in the church but not of it.
The woman in David's church was of a languorous, sumptuous type, built on generous proportions, with a mass of dark hair waving low on her forehead, with dark, straight-gazing, deep-searching eyes, the kind that impel and hold all truanting glances. She was slow in movement, suggesting a beautiful and commendable laziness. In public she talked very little, laughing never, but often smiling,--a curious smile that curved one corner of her lip and drew down the tip of one eye. She had been married, but no one knew anything about her husband. She was a member of the church, attended with most scrupulous regularity, assisted generously in a financial way, was on good terms with every one, and had not one friend in the congregation. The women were afraid of her. So were the men. But for different reasons.
Those who would ask questions of her, ran directly against the concrete wall of the crooked smile, and turned away abashed, unsatisfied.
Carol was very shy with her. She was not used to the type. There had been women in her father's churches, but they had been of different kinds. Mrs. Waldemar's straight-staring eyes embarrassed her. She listened silently when the other women talked of her, half admiringly, half sneeringly, and she grew more timid. She watched her fascinated in church, on the street, whenever they were thrown together. But one deep look from the dark eyes set her a-flush and rendered her tongue-tied.
Mrs. Waldemar had paid scant attention to David before the advent of Carol, except to follow his movements with her eyes in a way of which he could not remain unconscious. But when Carol came, entered the demon of mischief. Carol was young, Mrs. Waldemar was forty. Carol was lovely, Mrs. Waldemar was only unusual. Carol was frank as the sunshine, Mrs. Waldemar was mysterious. What woman on earth but might wonder if the devoted groom were immune to luring eyes, and if that lovely bride were jealous?
So