“I mean to attend services,” returned Gail graciously, looking up into the organ loft, where the organist was making his third attempt at that baffling run in the Bach prelude.
“You haven’t said how you like our famous old church,” suggested the Reverend Smith Boyd with pleasant ease, though he felt relieved that she was going.
The sudden snap in Gail’s eyes fairly scintillated. It was like the shattering of fine glass in the sunlight.
“It seems to be a remarkably lucrative enterprise,” she smiled up at him, and was rewarded by a snort from Uncle Jim and a chuckle from silvery-bearded Rufus Manning. Allison frankly guffawed. The balance of the sedate vestry was struck dumb by the impertinence.
Gail felt the eyes of the Reverend Smith Boyd fixed steadily on her, and turned to meet them. They were cold. She had thought them blue; but now they were green! She stared back into them for a moment, and a little red spot came into the delicate tint of her oval cheeks; then she turned deliberately to the marvellously beautiful big transept window. It had been designed by the most famous stained-glass artist in the world, and its subject lent itself to a wealth of colour. It was Christ turning the money changers out of the temple!
CHAPTER II
“WHY?”
“Snow!” exclaimed Gail in delight, turning up her face to the delicate flakes. “And the sun shining. That means snow to-morrow!”
Allison helped her into his big, piratical looking runabout, and tucked her in as if she were some fragile hot-house plant which might freeze with the first cool draught. He looked, with keen appreciation, at her fresh cheeks and sparkling eyes and softly waving hair. He had never given himself much time for women, but this girl was a distinct individual. It was not her undeniable beauty which he found so attractive. He had met many beautiful women. Nor was it charm of manner, nor the thing called personal magnetism, nor the intelligence which gleamed from her eyes. It was something intangible and baffling which had chained his interest from the moment she had appeared in the vestry doorway, and since he was a man who had never admitted the existence of mysteries, his own perplexity puzzled him.
“The pretty white snow is no friend of mine,” he assured her, as he took the wheel and headed towards the Avenue. He looked calculatingly into the sky. “This particular downfall is likely to cost the Municipal Transportation Company several thousand dollars.”
“I’m curious to know the commercial value of a sunset in New York,” Gail smiled up at him. Her eyes closed for a swift instant, her long, brown lashes curving down on her cheeks, but beneath them was an infinitesimal gleam; and Allison had the impression that under the cover of her exquisitely veined lids she was looking at him corner-wise, and having a great deal of fun all by herself.