"So your name is Cecilia! Why, you are almost a namesake of mine!"
The little girl did not seem to find this a very interesting circumstance, however, and only seemed glad to escape further notice by a speedy retreat, while Mr. Chillingworth luxuriously resigned himself to the enjoyment of the softly flowing "Songs without Words" which Miss Blanchard played so well. By and by, he asked her to sing for him a song with words, naming one of his favorites, "My Queen." And, as he listened to her rich, clear voice, and watched, with æsthetic pleasure, the graceful poise of her head and figure, he thought that she seemed no inapt illustration of "that sweet calm" which was just his own ideal.
CHAPTER XIX.
"MODERN MIRACLES."
Nora found that she and her brother and sister would have several of their friends for companions at Roland Graeme's lecture. Kitty Farrell was bent on going, though Nora, of course, suspected that it was much more for the sake of Waldberg's part in it, than of Roland's. Mr. Archer, despite his somewhat cynical indifference, had some curiosity to see how Roland would acquit himself as a lecturer, and had actually proposed that Miss Pomeroy should accompany him. She, moreover, had very willingly assented. She was a girl of some mind and character, who had grown heartily sick of the inane and monotonously luxurious life she lived, and did not feel much interest in the meetings her mother was perpetually attending. She was glad, therefore, of any new sensation that seemed to offer a little unusual excitement. And the more she heard her father's irritated remarks on Roland's "dangerous doctrines," the more her curiosity was aroused to hear these "dangerous doctrines" for herself. And Mr. Wharton—who had been led, by his discussions with Miss Harley, to reconsider the labor question in some of its aspects—wished to hear all that Roland had to say, as a contribution to the material he was collecting for a contemplated magazine article on the character and prospects of the "movement." Mr. Wharton and Mr. Archer had offered their services to escort Miss Pomeroy and Miss Farrell; as young Pomeroy, who did not care for "any such stuff," had some more attractive engagement for that evening. The party stopped at Dr. Blanchard's, en route for the lecture-hall, and took up the two ladies, leaving the busy doctor to look in when he could. It was a glorious moonlight night, the silvery radiance reflected back from the pure, white snow, making the night as clear as the day, while the pure, exhilarating air made it a delight to be out.
"What a perfect night!" exclaimed Mr. Archer. "Really it seems a shame to go to sit in a stuffy hall, instead of enjoying it out of doors."
"Well, we don't think of that, you know, when we go to a party," laughed Kitty, who was walking with Nora and Mr. Archer.
"There are some other folks out on a tramp," said Mr. Archer, as a little procession of men and women, singing a rousing hymn, filed along a street not far off. "There goes the Salvation Army, trying to improve the world in its way, as Graeme is trying in his. But what does it all amount to?"
"To something, I should hope!" exclaimed Nora. "And in any case, it's something to try! Surely you are not so faithless as to progress, Mr. Archer?"