The Yoke of the Thorah. Harland Henry

what could the matter be? What had happened to annoy her?

      “Please, Miss Redwood,” Elias pleaded, “please be frank with me. Perhaps I am keeping you from something?”

      Her eyes were fixed dreamily upon the window-pane behind his shoulder.

      “I was only thinking,” she confessed in a slow, pensive manner, “of what a beautiful day it is, and that”—She stopped herself.

      “And that—”

      “That's all. Nothing else.”

      “Oh, yes, there was. Please tell me. And that—?”

      “And that—now the winter is upon us—that we shan't have many more like it. There.”

      “Ah, I see! And you were longing to be out of doors, enjoying it. No wonder.”

      She colored up and began protesting.

      “Oh, really, Mr. Bacharach; no, indeed—”

      “Oh, yes, you were. No use denying it. And so far as I'm concerned, I've done a good morning's work already. And, I propose that we go and join your father in the park—if you know where to find him?”

      “Oh, yes, I know where to find him. Shall I put on my things? One sitting, more or less—if it's going to take so very, very long—won't count, will it?”

      A few moments later they had entered the park, and were sauntering down a sunlit pathway. Christine's hair glowed like a web of fine flames. Roses bloomed in her cheeks. Her eyes sparkled. She vowed that there had never before been such a delicious day. How soft the air was, and yet how crisp! How sweet it smelled! How exquisitely the leafless branches of the trees, gilded by the sunshine, were penciled against the deep blue of the sky! The sunshine transfigured every thing. What rich and varied colors it brought out upon the landscape! What reds, what purples, what yellows! Had Mr. Bacharach ever seen any thing equal to it? Was it not a keen pleasure merely to breathe, merely to exist, upon such a day? By and by they turned a corner, and came upon a bench.

      “Oh,” exclaimed Christine, halting abruptly, “he's not here.”

      “Who?” Elias asked.

      “Why, my father.”

      “Oh, to be sure; I had forgotten.”

      “This is his favorite bench. He always sits here. Now, what can have become of him?”

      “Perhaps he has walked on a little.”

      “I suppose he has. But he can't have gone far. He never does. We'll soon overtake him.”

      At the end of another quarter hour, however, they had not yet overtaken him.

      “I'm afraid we've missed him,” she said; “though it's very strange, because he never goes anywhere else, but just in this direction. I think we may as well give up the search. But I'm a little tired, and would you mind sitting down and resting for a moment before turning back?”

      “I should like nothing better; only, I must warn you that I haven't the remotest notion how we are to find our way out of here. The paths we have taken have been so crooked, I've entirely lost my reckoning.”

      “Ah, but I—I know the park by heart. I could find my way anywhere in it, blindfold, I think.”

      “Indeed? How did you get so well acquainted?”

      “Oh, we've lived within a stone's throw of it all my life. When I was a little girl I used to play here. Then I had to cross it twice a day, when I went to the Normal College. And since then I've made a practice of taking long walks here every afternoon. There's scarcely a tree or stone that I'm not familiar with; and I've discovered lots of delightful little places—nooks and corners—that nobody else suspects the existence of. Sometime I'd like to show you some of them. They'd be splendid to paint.”

      By this time they were seated.

      “Oh, thank you,” said Elias, “that will be charming. And so, you went to the Normal College?”

      “Yes; I graduated there last spring.”

      “Graduated! Why, I shouldn't have thought you were old enough!”

      “How old do you think I am?”

      “Seventeen?”

      “Oh, ever so much older. Guess again.”

      “Eighteen, then?”

      “I'll be nineteen in January—January third—just one month from to-day.”

      “Mercy! You're very venerable, to be sure. And then, having graduated from the Normal College, what an immense deal of wisdom you must possess, too!”

      She laughed as gayly as though he had perpetrated a rare witticism; and then said, “No, seriously, I never learned much at the Normal College—I mean in the classes—except a lot of mathematics and Latin, which I've forgotten all about now. I learned a little from the other girls, though. Some of them were wonderfully intelligent and cultivated; and they put me on the track of good books and such things. Shall we start home now?” (They rose and began to retrace their steps.) “Tell me, Mr. Bacharach, what is the one book which you like best of all?”

      “That's rather a hard question. Suppose I were to put it to you, could you answer it?”

      “Oh, yes. I think 'Adam Bede' is the greatest book that was ever written.”

      “That's saying a vast deal, isn't it?”

      “Well, of course, I mean the greatest book of its kind—the most vivid and truthful picture of real deep feeling. I wasn't thinking of scientific books, or essays, or histories, like Spencer, or Emerson, or Macaulay. I mean, it pierces-deeper into the heart, than any other book that I have read.”

      “Have you ever read 'Wilhelm Meister?'”

      “No. I was going to, though. One of the girls lent me a copy—Carlyle's translation. She said it was splendid. But when my father saw it he made me give it back. He holds very old-fashioned ideas of literature, you know; and he says that Goethe is demoralizing. His taste in music is old-fashioned, too. He never will take me to hear good music. It bores him dreadfully. He likes to go to grand sacred concerts on Sunday evening, where they play Strauss and Offenbach, and then at the end 'Home, Sweet Home.' Strauss and Offenbach and even 'Home, Sweet Home' are very well of their kind; but one tires of them after a while, don't you think so? I haven't been at a Symphony or Philharmonic for more than a year.”

      “Why don't you go to the rehearsals?”

      “Why, he won't take me to the rehearsals, any more than to the concerts.”

      “But you can go to them alone. They're in the afternoon.”

      “Oh, but I can't bear to hear music alone. I I must have somebody with me, or else I don't enjoy it at all. I always want somebody to nudge, when the music is especially thrilling; don't you?”

      “Yes, one longs for a sympathetic neighbor,” Elias admitted; and thought in his own soul, “I wish the old man would deputize me; it must be exceedingly pleasant to be nudged by her little elbow.”

      When they had reached the house, Christine asked him whether he wouldn't come in for a little while; and he replied that he guessed he would, for the purpose of putting away his paraphernalia, which he had left cluttering up the parlor. Inside they found old Redwood, who explained that he had departed from his custom that morning, and chosen quite a different quarter of the park for his outing. Elias stowed his things under the piano. As he was doing so, a bell rang below stairs.

      “Dinner,” announced the old man. “Come, Mr. Bacharach.”

      Elias began to make his excuses.

      “Oh, none o' that!” the old man cried, grasping