“So it’s all settled, Miss Adair—let me call you Cicely, will you?” said Miss Gallatin.
“No, but say Cis; I like it!” Cis responded to the affection in the rugged, patient, lonely face over her shoulder. “Yes, it’s settled! See the ring? I’m to be married at Christmas, if you please! My birthday.”
“Are you a Noël maid?” asked Miss Gallatin. “I noticed the ring; most beautiful! Now I understand the holly leaves and the ruby single holly berry. A marvellous ruby, a significant and beautiful design for a Christmas girl!”
“Rod made the design; he calls me Holly,” said Cis proudly. “He’s a great Rodney!”
“Has he come back to the Church to thank God for you where He should be thanked?” asked Miss Gallatin softly. “I want to be sure of your happiness, my dear.”
“Dear me, no, he hasn’t, Miss Gallatin!” Cis laughed, but she spoke impatiently. “He is so good as it is, that I’m sure he’s all right. I can’t seem to worry over Rod!”
“You’ve got to build your house square with its foundation, if it’s to stand,” said Miss Gallatin. “Dear Cis, I do hope you’ll be happy; be blessed, which is more. I suppose it may be that you’re to be the torch bearer, lead G. Rodney Moore to heaven. God sees farther than we can! Did you like Mr. Lancaster?”
“Who’s Mr. Lancaster? Oh, that man downstairs? He seems all right, plays like a dream, though I always think it is a little queer for a man to play the piano. Isn’t he sort of religious-crazy? All right to be a Catholic, but you can’t keep at it all the time, as if it was a hurdy-gurdy and the pennies would stop if you stopped grinding it!” Cis laughed at herself, and gathered up her gloves, ready to go.
“Oh, my child, can’t you see the difference between grinding at a thing and being permeated with it?” cried Miss Gallatin. “You don’t grind at the thought of Rod; you feel him, you breathe him, though you are not consciously thinking of him. So it is with the love of God; God is, and you exist in Him; there is nothing that is not of Him in all your actions and thoughts, though it may be only that His presence is beneath it all, not conscious every instant to your mind. Thus Anselm Lancaster loves God.”
Cis stopped short in her passage to the door, and stared silently for a moment at Hannah Gallatin. Then she said slowly: