how have you entered my diocese without my knowledge?" asked the
Bishop. And Felicia looked so like that beautiful, clean, educated,
refined world he once knew, that he might be pardoned for seeing in
her something of the old Paradise. Although, to speak truth for him,
he had no desire to go back to it.

"Well, dear Bishop," said Felicia, who had always called him so, "I
knew how overwhelmed you were with your work. I did not want to
burden you with my plans. And besides, I am going to offer you my
services. Indeed, I was just on my way to see you and ask your
advice. I am settled here for the present with Mrs. Bascom, a
saleswoman who rents our three rooms, and with one of Rachel's music
pupils who is being helped to a course in violin by Virginia Page.
She is from the people," continued Felicia, using the words "from
the people" so gravely and unconsciously that her hearer smiled,
"and I am keeping house for her and at the same time beginning an
experiment in pure food for the masses. I am an expert and I have a
plan I want you to admire and develop. Will you, dear Bishop?"

"Indeed I will," he replied. The sight of Felicia and her remarkable
vitality, enthusiasm and evident purpose almost bewildered him.

"Martha can help at the Settlement with her violin and I will help
with my messes. You see, I thought I would get settled first and
work out something, and then come with some real thing to offer. I'm
able to earn my own living now."

"You are?" the Bishop said a little incredulously. "How? Making
those things?"

"Those things!" said Felicia with a show of indignation. "I would
have you know, sir, that 'those things' are the best-cooked, purest
food products in this whole city."

"I don't doubt it," he replied hastily, while his eyes twinkled,
"Still, 'the proof of the pudding'--you know the rest."

"Come in and try some!" she exclaimed. "You poor Bishop! You look as
if you hadn't had a good meal for a month."

She insisted on his entering the little front room where Martha, a
wide-awake girl with short, curly hair, and an unmistakable air of
music about her, was busy with practice.

"Go right on, Martha. This is the Bishop. You have heard me speak of
him so often. Sit down there and let me give you a taste of the
fleshpots of Egypt, for I believe you have been actually fasting."

So they had an improvised lunch, and the Bishop who, to tell the
truth, had not taken time for weeks to enjoy his meals, fea