ld come before her mind's eye, not now Tom Caruthers'
face, but the vision of a pair of pleasant grey eyes at once keen and
gentle; or of a close head of hair with a white hand roving amid the
thick locks of it; or the outlines of a figure manly and lithe; or some
little thing done with that ease of manner which was so winning.
Sometimes she saw them as in Mrs. Wishart's drawing-room, and sometimes
at the table in the dear old house in Shampuashuh, and sometimes under
the drip of an umbrella in a pouring rain, and sometimes in the old
schoolhouse. Manly and kind, and full of intelligence, filled with
knowledge, well-bred, and noble; so Lois thought of him. Yet he was not
a Christian, therefore no fit partner for Madge or for any one else who
was a Christian. Could that be the absolute fact? Must it be? Was such
the inevitable and universal conclusion? On what did the logic of it
rest? Some words in the Bible bore the brunt of it, she knew; Lois had
read them and talked them over with her grandmother; and now an
irresistible desire took possession of her to read them again, and more
critically. She jumped up and ran up-stairs for her Bible.

The fire was down in her own room; the gas was not lit; so she went
back to the bright drawing-room, which to-night she had all to herself.
She laid her book on the table and opened it, and then was suddenly
checked by the question--what did all this matter to her, that she
should be so fiercely eager about it? Dismay struck her anew. What was
any un-Christian man to her, that her heart should beat so at
considering possible relations between them? No such relations were
desired by any such person; what ailed Lois even to take up the
subject? If Mr. Dillwyn liked either of the sisters particularly, it
was Madge. Probably his liking, if it existed, was no more than Tom
Caruthers', of which Lois thought with great scorn. Still, she argued,
did it not concern her to know with certain'ty what Madge ought to do,
in the event of Mr. Dillwyn being not precisely like Tom Caruthers?

CHAPTER XLIII.

ABOUT WORK.

The sound of the opening door made her start up. She would not have
even a servant surprise her so; kneeling on the floor with her face
buried in her hands on the table. She started up hurriedly; and then
was confounded to see entering--Mr. Dillwyn himself. She had heard no
ring of the door-bell; that must have been when she was up-stairs
getting her Bible. Lois found