Emmy Lou's Road to Grace: Being a Little Pilgrim's Progress

by George Madden Martin

Uncle Charlie shouted, but Papa's laugh was a little rueful. "Poor little mole working i' the dark. Will the light never break for her, Charlie, do you suppose?"

What did he mean, and why is he rueful? Is the trouble with her who would give all she is or hopes to be in adoring offering to Papa? Can he, even in the light of what she has heard today, be open to criticism? Certainly not. Papa may be a Bohemian, and a Bohemian may not be a Christian, but what he is that shall Emmy Lou be also.

To decide is to act. Papa went down town after dinner with Uncle Charlie, and Emmy Lou took her place at the piano. Ordinarily she is loath to practice, going through the ordeal because Aunt Cordelia requires it. But today she goes about it as a practical matter with a definite purpose.

Papa brought her the "Selections From the Operas" some while back, with the remark that a little change from exercises to melody might introduce cheer into a melancholy business all around. But so far this had not been the result, "Selection No. 1—Sextette from Lucia," reducing her to tears, and "Selection No. 2—I Dreamt That I Dwelt in Marble Halls," doing almost as much for Aunt Cordelia.

But now that Emmy Lou had a purpose, the matter was different. There was a table of contents to the "Selections From the Operas," and a certain title therein had caught her eye in the past. Seated on the piano-stool, leaning over the book on her lap, she passed her finger down the list.

Selection 13. She thought so. She found the page and replaced the open book upon the rack. Fra Diavolo. She set to work. What Papa is that will she be also.

She desisted by and by long enough to go and ask a question of Aunt Cordelia.

"If I were to be confirmed at St. Simeon's could I practice my selections on Sunday?"

"Practice them on Sunday?" Aunt Cordelia had enough trouble getting her to practice on week-days to be outdone with the question. "Why do you ask such a thing? You know you could not."

That night Emmy Lou asked Papa a question a little falteringly: "Are you a Bohemian?"