. They hoped she
would have a good night.

Then he went back to his room and thought about her some more. He had an
important English examination the next day, one in which he especially
wanted to do well; yet try as he would to concentrate on Wells and Shaw,
that girl and what was going to become of her would get in between him
and his book.

It was after ten o'clock when he sauntered down the hall and stood in
Stephen Marshall's room for a few minutes, as he was getting the habit
of doing every night. The peace of it and the uplift that that room
always gave him were soothing to his soul. If he had known a little more
about the Christ to whose allegiance he had declared himself he might
have knelt and asked for guidance; but as yet he had not so much as
heard of a promise to the man who "abides," and "asks what he will."
Nevertheless, when he entered that room his mind took on the attitude of
prayer and he felt that somehow the Presence got close to him, so that
questions that had perplexed him were made clear.

As he stood that night looking about the plain walls, his eyes fell upon
that picture of Stephen Marshall's mother. A mother! Ah! if there were a
mother somewhere to whom that girl could go! Some one who would
understand her; be gentle and tender with her; love her, as he should
think a real mother would do--what a difference that would make!

He began to think over all the women he knew--all the mothers. There
were not so many of them. Some of the professors' wives who had sons and
daughters of their own? Well, they might be all well enough for their
own sons and daughters, but there wasn't one who seemed likely to want
to behave in a very motherly way to a stranger like his waif of a girl.
They were nice to the students, polite and kind to the extent of one tea
or reception apiece a year, but that was about the limit.

Well, there was Tennelly's mother! Dignified, white-haired, beautiful,
dominant in her home and clubs, charming to her guests; but--he could
just fancy how she would raise her lorgnette and look "Bonnie" Brentwood
over. There would be no room in that grand house for a girl like Bonnie.
Bonnie! How the name suited her! He had a strange protective feeling
about that girl, not as if she were like the other girls he knew;
perhaps it was a sort of a "Christ-brother" feeling, as the minister had
suggested. But to go on with the list of mothers--wasn't there one
anywhere to whom he could appeal?