It was a magnetic word. From that instant, Jean wanted to go. It did not take long to make her arrangements, and she packed up her clothes and painting materials in no time.
"Miss Lorraine," she said the evening before she went, "do you think I am wasting my life?"
Miss Lorraine looked at her.
"Are you feeling you are?" she asked.
Jean fidgetted in her chair. She was sitting by the window, which was open, and enjoying the scent of the mignonette and heliotrope in the balcony.
"I remember," she said, without answering the question, "that Colonel Douglas said to me just before I came to London, 'Seek the best thing first, not last.' I asked him what he meant, and he said that it would be the one thing that would bring no disillusion or disappointment; he warned me that it must not be the sham or counterfeit, but the genuine article. I thought he meant fame then, but I have begun to think differently lately. And I have had disillusions in my art life. What do you think is the best thing to seek after?"
Miss Lorraine was silent for a moment; then she said softly—
"'Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,
and all these things shall be added unto you.'"
"I felt you would say something like that," said Jean after a pause; "and I want to tell you something before I go away from you. I have been—what you call seeking, but I can't find."
Miss Lorraine looked her sympathy. Jean went on hurriedly—