frank came home from oxford early in june—nominally to read with blathwayte during the long; and then we had indeed a merry time at restham, the maddest, merriest time i ever had in my life, before or since. in fact, the whole of the summer was as a midsummer night's dream to me. i suggested that although frank had to work at the rectory for such part of the day as he deigned to waste upon study, there was no reason why he should not render his home at the manor. i thought that, this arrangement would make the house more cheerful for fay; for—though she was far too sweet and unselfish ever to betray such a feeling—i could not help being conscious that the society of two such middle-aged fogies as annabel and myself was but poor company for a girl of nineteen. of course fay was delighted at this suggestion of mine, and annabel not much less so. if my sister had a soft place in her heart, except the one reserved for me, that place was most certainly occupied by frank wildacre.

to my surprise the only person who did not approve of this arrangement was ponty.

"so i hear mr. wildacre is coming to live here now," she said to me one morning, in her most ungracious manner; "the manor will soon be as full of couples as noah's ark."

"but i thought you were fond of mr. wildacre," i feebly urged.

"so i am, sir reginald—in his proper place: just as i am of miss annabel. but things out of their own place are worse than useless, as the woman said when she found the cat in the tea-kettle." ponty never addressed me as "sir reginald" unless i was in dire disgrace with her.

"and he will be such nice company for her ladyship," i went on, ashamed of my own cowardice, yet persisting in it. my passion for peace at any price has always been one of my most unworthy characteristics. i envy those people who can annoy their fellows without turning a hair.

"of course, sir reginald, you are master in your own house—at least, you ought to be," said ponty darkly; "and if you are set on spending your married life in playing 'oranges and lemons,' nobody can stop you. everybody's got the right to spoil their own lives in their own way, more's the pity! i remember a married couple at poppenhall who would have the wife's brother to live with them, and he fell into the fire and was burnt to death, through having epileptic fits."

"but he'd have fallen into the fire just the same if he hadn't lived with them," i argued, with a culpable lack of dignity; "and then they would always have blamed themselves for having neglected him."

"that is as may be, sir reginald: he might or he might not. but as it was, they did blame themselves, i can tell you, and the husband took to drink in consequence, he blamed himself so much."

"well, i don't think he need have gone to such lengths as that by way of expiating his mistake," i said cheerfully. "and besides, that has no bearing upon the present case, as mr. wildacre doesn't suffer from fits."

ponty sighed the heavy sigh of disapproval. "there are other things besides fits, sir reginald."

i remarked that fortunately there were, and then left the nursery. i should have been irritated with ponty, but her unbounded admiration of fay made me freely forgive her anything and everything. still i wondered at her attitude, though i was fast learning not to be surprised at any vagary of the feminine mind, but just to accept it as one of the unfathomable mysteries.

frank's presence at the manor made a wonderful difference to fay. he stimulated what i called the elfin side of her nature, and brought out those qualities which she possessed in common with him. i have frequently noticed that when members of the same family are together, all the family traits rise to the surface, while individual characteristics fall into abeyance for the time being. the unit is, so to speak, merged in the tribe.

i remarked upon this one day at breakfast.

"i know what you mean," said frank. (the wildacres were always very quick to catch an idea.) "the joneses become all jones, and the smiths become all smith at their christmas family dinner, and the separate johns and roberts and marias, with their individual characteristics, are swallowed up in the great nirvana of jonesism and smithism."

"and jonesism and smithism are consequently tremendously intensified," fay chimed in; "it is only at such family gatherings that one realises the hugeness of the jones nose, or the bitterness of the smith temper. i expect when all the hapsburgs are together the size of their historical under lip becomes something stupendous."

"i do not quite see how a christmas party can lengthen anybody's nose or swell their under lip," remarked annabel, full of patient endeavour to discover a grain of sense in all the chaff of our nonsense.

"unless it ended in a fight," suggested frank.

"oh, of course, in that case it might; but i thought you were talking of friendly family gatherings."

"so we were, annabel," i explained; "fay and frank were only speaking figuratively." i was always so dreadfully afraid that my sister would consider fay foolish.

fay went on with the conversation. it was a matter of absolute indifference to her whether annabel considered her foolish or not, and this grieved me, as i was so anxious for annabel to do my darling justice, and i could see that fay herself sometimes rendered this difficult. "but when members of a family marry," she said, "and go to houses of their own, their respective personalities develop, and what frank calls the jones-and-smith nirvana is broken up. then we see that what we imagined to be a complete tea-set was really a collection of separate pieces of different kinds of china."

"but throw them together at their christmas party," added frank, "and they will at once grow into each other's likeness, and your tribal tea-set will be complete once more."

"you children talk so fast that i really cannot follow you," said annabel good-naturedly from behind the coffee-urn. "i don't see how noses and under lips can turn into tea-sets."

"they can't," i agreed. "all we were saying is that when members of the same family are together, they bring out the family characteristics in each other."

but annabel was not grateful for my efforts on her behalf. "you said that some time ago, reggie; of course i understood that, though i don't altogether agree with it. but it is the things that the children have said since that slightly confused me."

i wished annabel would not always speak of frank and fay as "the children." it seemed so to emphasise the gulf between fay and myself. but annabel had got into the habit of thus speaking of them before my marriage; and annabel and a habit, when once formed, were inseparable.

"i know why you said it, reggie," said fay, who could always read me like a book. i often wished that i could as easily read her! "you were thinking that when frank is here i am much more of a wildacre than when he isn't: just as when you are with annabel you are much more of a kingsnorth than when you are alone with me."

that was exactly what i had been thinking—at least, the former part of it; i did not at all agree with fay that i was more of a kingsnorth when i was with annabel, but it was rather a shock to hear it thus crudely put into words. that is what strikes me about the young people of to-day: they are so much more outspoken than we were at their age. our parents veiled truth—we clothed her—but the present generation treats her as the earl of mercia treated godiva. and this treatment is slightly upsetting to us who were brought up so differently.

annabel answered for me. "that is only natural, my dear, considering that frank and you are the same age, and reggie and i are so much older. it is nice for the young to be with the young, it keeps them bright and cheerful, and it is depressing for them to be constantly with persons old enough to be their parents."

fay's grey eyes flashed. "i never find it depressing to be with reggie," she retorted, somewhat hotly. "he always bucks me up."

but annabel's temper remained impregnable. it was only cutler who had the power to shake that fortress. "i never said you did, my dear. you are far too loyal a little wife ever to think of such a thing. but it is natural for youth to cling to youth; it would be abnormal of it if it didn't."

fay still looked angry. "i don't care a twopenny dam if i am abnormal or not. i never want to cling to anybody but reggie."

i felt it was time to step in. i didn't want fay to say anything to offend annabel. "of course you don't, darling, and i am only too delighted to be clung to to any extent; it is most warming and comforting to me. but i fear annabel is right in regarding me as the old oak tree to which the ivy clings."

fay slipped her hand into mine, under cover of the breakfast-table. "you aren't a bit old, reggie!" she said indignantly. "is he, frank?"

"i've known older," replied frank guardedly.

at this we all laughed—especially annabel. frank's jokes usually appealed to her, though fay's didn't, which was strange, as the twins resembled each other mentally almost as much as they did physically: it was only in the deeper places of the spirit that the resemblance ended.

"reggie is not old and he is not young," said annabel; "i never can understand why people make such a fuss about their ages. i am forty-eight and reggie is forty-three this year, and i make no bones about it, and it would be no good if i did, as it's in burke and debrett for all the world to read. and i really don't think, my dear fay, that 'a twopenny dam' is at all a nice expression for a young lady to use: i cannot bear to hear women swear."

"it isn't swearing, miss kingsnorth," cried frank, who was always ready to stick up for his sister; "it's a foreign coin which was much used by the great duke of wellington."

"so i've heard," replied annabel, with doubt in her tone. "but all i can say is that if it isn't swearing, it sounds uncommonly like it, and i'm sure that any ordinary person hearing it would do fay an injustice, and imagine that she was given to bad language."

i felt it was time to read the riot act and disperse the company; so i rose from the table and took my pipe out of my pocket, saying: "come on, little girl, and watch me smoking in the garden. it will be a soothing, soporific sight."

fay jumped up and followed me, as i knew she would. one of her most fascinating tricks was a habit she had of trotting about the house and garden after me like a little child. and yet in some things she was so much of a woman!

"i say, sweetheart," i said as soon as we were out of earshot of the house, "i wouldn't use strong language before annabel, if i were you. she doesn't understand it, and it gives her false ideas of you."

fay's scarlet lips pouted. "it wasn't strong language. frank told you it wasn't."

it always annoyed me when fay quoted frank, and especially when she did so in order to confute me. "i know, my darling; but annabel thought it was."

"i can't help annabel's thoughts. she thought you were old!"

i laughed, and patted the soft, white cheek so near to my own as we sat down side by side on a garden-seat. "no, she didn't, little one."

"well, anyway she said so."

"no, she didn't. she said i was forty-three—which i am, and forty-three seems quite young to annabel, though old to you."

fay still looked angry. "indeed it doesn't. it seems quite young to me. and whatever it seems, i don't see the good of harping on it and rubbing it in, as annabel is always doing. if she says 'forty-three' again, i shall say 'twopenny dam.'"

i laughed outright. fay was so delicious when she was annoyed, like a brilliant little bird with ruffled plumage. then i said softly, as i put my arms round her slender waist: "no you won't, sweetheart, you'll never say it again, if it vexes annabel. i want you and annabel to love each other more than i want anything in the world."

"more than you want you and me to love each other?"

"that wish has been already fulfilled—by the greatest miracle that ever happened."

fay nestled closer to me. "it isn't very polite of you to say that your loving me is anything in the miracle line."

"i didn't. it is in your loving me that the miracle comes in. i didn't set the dial ten degrees forward: you set it ten degrees backward."

my wife looked up at me with laughter in her wonderful eyes. "and you want me to do the trick again with annabel? really, reggie, that is a little bit too thick! and besides, she wouldn't like it. the dial of annabel is quite a different make from the dial of ahaz. it is one of those that can't be put back even five minutes without upsetting all the machinery and making the strikes go wrong, like our dining-room clock. and i wouldn't upset annabel's machinery for worlds! i should feel like cutler if i did."

"and even cutler didn't upset it this year, if i remember rightly."

fay shook her head. "no, the forget-me-not bed this last spring was the last word in forget-me-not beds. it was a thing of beauty and a joy for the end of april and quite the whole of may. i wanted to bathe in it, if you remember, but annabel thought i might get drowned or something, and so i refrained."

"annabel has her funny little ways, i admit," i said, feeling that this was the moment for a word in season on my sister's behalf; "but she is the best and kindest woman in the world, and she is really devoted to you, my darling, though she doesn't always understand you."

"she does not like me anything like as much as she likes frank."

"she really does—underneath her quiet manner; but she has always been a most undemonstrative woman," i persisted, feeling bound to defend my sister against an accusation of such arrant folly.

fay smiled. "what a darling old ostrich it is!" she said, stroking my hand. "does it like to keep its dear head in the sand, and go on pretending to itself that rocks are palm-trees and dry streams wells of water? then it shall, if it likes. but all the same, my reggie, it's rather stupid of you always to pretend that things are what you want them to be; because they aren't, and you'll have a tremendous waking up some fine morning."

"i'm not pretending," i said stoutly.

"yes, you are. you are always pretending to yourself that annabel is devoted to me, and she really isn't one little bit. frank says she isn't, and if he can see it i'm sure you ought to, reggie. there is no harm in her not admiring me: it would be very strange if she did, considering how much older she is and how different we are; and she really is awfully nice to me, considering everything. frank admits that. but when you go on pretending that she spends her life in sighing like a furnace for me, and writing odes to my eyebrows—why, then, i get so impatient of it all that i find it difficult to see how nice she really is."

"all that would be quite right, sweetheart, if i really were pretending. but i'm not. i know annabel a jolly sight better than you do, and i know she is absolutely devoted to you."

and at that i left it and made love to my wife instead, a much more agreeable occupation, in spite of that jealousy of frank seething at the back of my mind.

as i had said to fay, i was absolutely convinced of annabel's devotion to her. and what wonder in that? who could live with my child-wife, as annabel and i lived with her, and see all her charms of person and beauties of character without loving her with all one's heart? she was made for love, my brilliant, beautiful darling, and she had it showered upon her in full measure. but i was not equally sure of fay's affection for annabel. i knew all my sister's virtues—none better; but i could see they were not exactly the brand of virtues most calculated to appeal to the young. annabel was prim and fussy and masterful; there was no denying it, and these characteristics—one could hardly call them faults—were just the qualities to blind the eyes of a girl to any corresponding virtues. therefore i felt it was for me, who really knew and understood my sister, to show both her superior points and screen her inferior ones when they were alike exposed to the piercing gaze of youthful eyes. though fay's youthful eyes were kind enough, frank's were quite the reverse, and i was becoming increasingly afraid of the influence of frank's clear-sighted callousness upon my wife. to him i was—i must inevitably be—an old fogey; but i did not like the idea of his sharing that impression of my fogeydom with fay.

as fay and i were sitting hand-in-hand upon the garden-seat that blissful june morning, a shadow fell upon the grass, and we saw jeavons approaching us with a message from the house.

"if you please, sir reginald," he began, coming as close to us before he spoke as if we had been deaf, after the manner of well-trained servants, "mrs. parkins out of the village has called to ask if you will kindly go and see her father-in-law, him being in terrible pain this morning with his sciatica, and asking for you all the time."

jeavons never used such words as "pray" or "heal" when he brought me messages from the village people begging for my ministrations. he reserved such expressions for what he considered their proper place—namely, the church and the doctor's surgery respectively. though they knew their own places—and kept to them—jeavons and annabel had much in common: the same absolute devotion to the conventional and the commonplace—the same horror of the emotional and the unusual.

i rose from my seat. "tell mrs. parkins that i will come at once," i said. "fay, will you come with me?"

"of course i will," she replied, and we crossed the lawn and went through the heavy garden-door, hatless as we were, into the village, and past the old inn to parkins's cottage.

i often took my wife with me when i went to visit the sick, because i believed that "two or three gathered together" literally meant two or three gathered together, and that therefore, when fay's supplications were added to mine, my prayer was all the more efficacious.

i have found life so much simpler and easier since i learned to take the bible literally, and not to be always reading between the lines to find out spiritual meanings which might or might not be there. i remember an enlightened and eminent modern dean once explaining to me that when christ said, "the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk and the lepers are cleansed," he meant that those hitherto blind to spiritual visions were enlightened, those hitherto deaf to sacred truths were made to hear them, those who had aforetime stumbled were able to walk in the paths of righteousness, and those steeped in sin were washed clean. "mr. dean," i replied, "you, as a dignitary of the church, probably know better than i what christ meant; a mere layman such as myself can only deal with what he said: and he didn't say anything at all like that."

i hate "reading between the lines," even in ordinary human correspondence. at least a third of the troubles of this life have their origin in their pernicious habit; for people read a great deal of unintentional enmity—and, still worse, a great deal of imaginary love—into pages actually virgin of either of these extremes. and when they read between the lines of holy scripture, they read in all their own prejudices and fads and fancies, until divine truth is distorted and perverted.

i can stand many things, but i cannot stand a bowdlerised bible.

fay and i entered the cottage, whither mrs. parkins had preceded us.

"it be good of you to come, sir reginald, and her ladyship too, but the poor old man be sufferin' something fearful, and all twisted up with the pain in his back and his legs. but he says if only you'll lay your hands on him and say a prayer like as you did before, the pain'll be bound to go."

"then we'll go up to him at once," i said; and mrs. parkins straightway preceded us up one of those steep and dark and narrow cottage-staircases which never fail to arouse in me an undying wonder that the poor ever keep their necks intact. i feel sure that guardian angels are as thick on cottage-staircases as they ever were on jacob's ladder.

"good-morning, mr. parkins," said fay as she entered the pretty and spotlessly clean bedchamber of old parkins; "we are very sorry the pain is so bad this morning, but sir reginald has come to cure it."

"parkins knows better than that," i said as i bent my head to pass through the low doorway, "don't you, parkins? you know as well as i do that it isn't i who cure the pain, but our lord working through me."

"ay, ay, sir reginald, i knows that well enough, becos you've told me; and you ought to know for sure and certain. but i'd be glad if somebody 'ud help me quick, for the pain's powerful bad this mornin'," and the poor old soul fairly groaned in his agony.

without more ado i knelt beside the bed and laid my hands on the poor, twisted limbs: and as i prayed i was conscious of the power descending on me, and passing through me to the old man in the bed. gradually the groans ceased, and the look of anguish passed from the wrinkled face as if it had been wiped off by a sponge, and parkins fell into the peaceful sleep of a tired child.

as i rose from my knees and stood by the sleeping sufferer whom i had been permitted to relieve, a great longing filled my heart for the time when there will no longer be any need for surgeons or physicians or spiritual healers, or for any other channels whereby the healing power of christ is conveyed to sick and suffering humanity—to the time when the knowledge of the lord shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea, and when there shall be no more sickness nor sorrow nor sighing, neither shall there be any more pain, because christ will be all in all.