"With me it has been only an accident," she said, simply. "I suppose there are people who had better reasons for selecting their church home. But I am very well satisfied with my place." And then Flossy was very glad that they were nearing her father's house. The gladness did not last, however. There hung over it another cross. This Col. Baker had been in the habit of being invited to enter, and of spending an hour or more in cosy chat with the family. Nothing confidential or special in these Sabbath evening calls; they seemed simply to serve to pass away a dull hour. They had been pleasant to Flossy. But it so happened that the hours of the Sabbath had grown precious to her; none of them were dull; every moment of them was needed.
Besides, in their walk up the hill from the auditorium one evening, Evan Roberts had said in answer to a wonderment from her that so little was accomplished by the Sabbath services throughout the land:
"I think one reason is the habit that so many people have of frittering a way any serious impression or solemn thought they may have had by a stream of small talk in which they indulge with their own family or their intimate friends, after what they call the Sabbath is past. Do you know there are hundreds of people, good, well-meaning—in fact, Christians—who seem to think that the old Puritan rules in regard to hours hold yet, in part. It begins at eight or nine o'clock, when they have their nap out; and at the very latest it closes with the minister's benediction after the second service; and they laugh and talk on the way home and at home as if the restraints of the day were over at last."
How precisely he had described the Sabbath day of the Shipley family. With what a sense of relief had she often sat and chatted with Col. Baker at the close of what had been to her an irksome day, and felt that at last the sense of propriety would not be shocked if they laughed and bantered each other as usual.
Things were different now. But poor Flossy's face flushed, and her heart beat hard over the trial of not asking Col. Baker to come in. Silly child! Ruth would have said, and her calm, clear voice would not have hesitated over the words; "Col. Baker, I can not ask you in this evening, because I have determined to receive no more calls, even from intimate friends, on the Sabbath. On any other evening I shall be happy to see you."
As for Marion, she would have decidedly enjoyed saying it. But Flossy, she could never have explained it to him. Her voice would have trembled too much, and her heart beat too hard. The very most that she could do was to keep her lips closed. No invitation from her should pass them, and this in itself was five times more of a cross than it would have been for either of the others to have spoken.
However, it did no good. Col. Baker's friendship was on too assured a footing to wait for ceremony. He had received too many invitations of that nature to even notice the omission now. Though Flossy paused and turned toward him he did not notice it, but himself opened the door for her and passed in at her side, talking still about some matter connected with his plans for the evening, that had been overthrown by her strange propensity for church.
She did not hear him at all; she was both grieved and annoyed. If only she dared go directly to her room! If she had been Ruth Erskine it would have been done in a moment.
They sat down in the back parlor, and it was made evident to Flossy that the entertainment of Col. Baker would be considered her special duty. The library door was closed, and the sound of subdued voices there told that Kitty Shipley and her suitor were having a confidential talk. Kitty wouldn't help, then. Mrs. Shipley had retired, and Mr. Shipley sat at the drop light reading the journal. He glanced up at their entrance, gave Col. Baker the courteous and yet familiar greeting that welcomed him as a special friend of the house, and then went on with his reading. As for her brother Charlie, he had not come in, and probably would not for hours to come.
What was there for Flossy to do but to take a seat and talk to Col. Baker? Yet how she shrank from it! She wanted to be alone, to go over in her heart all the sweet and blessed experiences of the day, for this day had helped her much. She wanted to think about those boys in the school, and form plans for their future, and try to decide whether it could be that they would really like her for a teacher, and whether Dr. Dennis would let her undertake the class. Why would not Col. Baker go home?