Monsignor Lafelle in his interview with Carmen had thrown out a hint of certain rumors regarding her; but the days passed, and the girl awoke not to their significance. Then, one morning, her attention was attracted by a newspaper report of the farewell address of a young priest about to leave his flock. When she opened the paper and caught sight of the news item she gave a little cry, and immediately forgot all else in her absorption in the closing words:

“––and I have known no other ambition since the day that little waif from a distant land strayed into my life, lighting the dead lamp of my faith with the torch of her own flaming spirituality. She said she had a message for the people up here. Would to God she might know that her message had borne fruit!”

The newspaper slipped from the girl’s hands to the floor. Her eyes, big and shining, stared straight before her. “And I will lead the blind by a way that they know not––” she murmured.

The telephone rang. It was Miss Wall, ready now for the postponed ride. Carmen clapped her hands and sang for joy as she summoned the car and made her preparations. “We’ll go over to his church,” she said aloud. “We’ll find him!” She hurried back to the newspaper to get the address of the church from which he had spoken the preceding day. “They will know where he is,” she said happily. “Oh, isn’t it just wonderful!”

A few minutes later, with Miss Wall at her side, she was speeding to the distant suburb where the little church was located.

“We are going to find a priest,” she said simply. “Oh, you mustn’t ask me any questions! Mrs. Hawley-Crowles doesn’t like to have me talk about certain things, and so I can’t tell you.”

Miss Wall glanced at her in wonder. But the happy, smiling countenance disarmed suspicion.

“Now tell me,” Carmen went on, “tell me about yourself. I’m a missionary, you know,” she added, thinking of Father Waite.

“A missionary! Well, are you trying to convert the society world?”

“Yes, by Christianity––not by what the missionaries are now teaching in the name of Christianity. I’ll tell you all about it some day. Now tell me, why are you unhappy? Why is your life pitched in such a minor key? Perhaps, together, we can change it to a major.”

Miss Wall could not help joining in the merry laugh. Then her face grew serious. “I am unhappy,” she said, “because I have arrived nowhere.”

Carmen looked at her inquiringly. “Well,” she said, “that shows you are on the wrong track, doesn’t it?”

“I’m tired of life––tired of everything, everybody!” Miss Wall sank back into the cushions with her lips pursed and her brow wrinkled.

“No, you are not tired of life,” said Carmen quietly; “for you do not know what life is.”

“No, I suppose not,” replied the weary woman. “Do you?” she asked abruptly.

“Yes, it is God.”

“Oh, don’t mention that name, nor quote Scripture to me!” cried the woman, throwing up her hands in exasperation. “I’ve had that stuff preached at me until it turned my stomach! I hope you are not an emotional, weepy religionist. Let’s not talk about that subject. I’m heartily sick of it!”

“All right,” replied Carmen cheerily. “Padre JosÈ used to say––”

“Who’s he?” demanded Miss Wall, somewhat curtly.

“Oh, he is a priest––”

“A priest! Dear me! do you constantly associate with priests, and talk religion?”

The young girl laughed. “Well,” she responded, “I’ve had a good deal to do with both.”

“And are you any better for it?”

“Oh, yes––lots!” she said quickly.

The woman regarded her with curiosity. “Tell me something about your life,” she said. “They say you are a princess.”

“Surely I am a princess,” returned Carmen, laughing merrily. “Listen; I will tell you about big, glorious SimitÍ, and the wonderful castle I lived in there, and about my Prime Minister, Don Rosendo, and––well, listen, and then judge for yourself if I am not of royal extraction!”

Laughing again up into the mystified face of Miss Wall, the enthusiastic girl began to tell about her former life in far-off GuamocÓ.

As she listened, the woman’s eyes grew wide with interest. At times she voiced her astonishment in sudden exclamations. And when the girl concluded her brief recital, she bent upon the sparkling face a look of mingled wonder and admiration. “Goodness! After going through all that, how can you be so happy now? And with all your kin down there in that awful war! Why––!”

“Don’t you think I am a princess now?” Carmen asked, smiling up at her.

“I think you are a marvel!” was the emphatic answer.

“And––you don’t want to know what it was that kept me through it all, and that is still guiding me?” The bright, animated face looked so eagerly, so lovingly, into the world-scarred features of her companion.

“Not if you are going to talk religion. Tell me, who is this priest you are seeking to-day, and why have you come to see him?”

“Father Waite. He is the one who found me––when I got lost––and took me to my friends.”

The big car whirled around a corner and stopped before a dingy little church edifice surmounted by a weather-beaten cross. On the steps of a modest frame house adjoining stood a man. He turned as the car came up.

“Father Waite!” Carmen threw wide the door of the car and sprang out. “Father Waite!” clasping his hands. “Don’t you know me? I’m Carmen!”

A light came into the startled man’s eyes. He recognized 164 her. Then he stepped back, that he might better see her. More than a year had passed since he had taken her, so oddly garbed, and clinging tightly to his hand, into the Ketchim office. And in that time, he thought, she had been transformed into a vision of heavenly beauty.

“Well!” cried the impatient girl. “Aren’t you going to speak?” And with that she threw her arms about him and kissed him loudly on both cheeks.

The man and Miss Wall gave vent to exclamations of astonishment. He colored violently; Miss Wall sat with mouth agape.

“Aren’t you glad to see me?” pursued the girl, again grasping his hands.

Then he found his tongue. “An angel from heaven could not be more welcome,” he said. But his voice was low, and the note of sadness was prominent.

“Well, I am an angel from heaven,” said the laughing, artless girl. “And I’m an Inca princess. And I’m just plain Carmen Ariza. But, whoever I am, I am, oh, so glad to see you again! I––” she looked about carefully––“I read your sermon in the newspaper this morning. Did you mean me?” she concluded abruptly.

He smiled wanly. “Yes, I meant you,” he softly answered.

“Come with me now,” said the eager girl. “I want to talk with you.”

“Impossible,” he replied, shaking his head.

“Then, will you come and see me?” She thought for a moment. “Why have you never been to see me? Didn’t you know I was still in the city?”

“Oh, yes,” he replied. “I used to see your name in the papers, often. And I have followed your career with great interest. But––you moved in a circle––from which I––well, it was hardly possible for me to come to see you, you know––”

“It was!” exclaimed the girl. “But, never mind, you are coming now. Here,” drawing a card from her bag, “this is the address of Madam Beaubien. Will you come there to-morrow afternoon, at two, and talk with me?”

He looked at the card which she thrust into his hand, and then at the richly-gowned girl before him. He seemed to be in a dream. But he nodded his head slowly.

“Tell me,” she whispered, “how is Sister Katie?”

Ah, if the girl could have known how that great-hearted old soul had mourned her “little bairn” these many months.

“I will go to see her,” said Carmen. “But first you will come to me to-morrow.” She beamed upon him as she clasped his hands again. Then she entered the car, and sat waving her hand back at him as long as he could see her.

It would be difficult to say which of the two, Miss Wall or Father Waite, was the more startled by this abrupt and lively rencontre. But to Carmen, as she sat back in the car absorbed in thought, it had been a perfectly natural meeting between two warm friends. Suddenly the girl turned to the woman. “You haven’t anything but money, and fine clothes, and automobiles, and jewels, you think. And you want something better. Do you know? I know what it is you want.”

“What is it?” asked the wondering woman, marveling at this strange girl who went about embracing people so promiscuously.

“Love.”

The woman’s lip trembled slightly when she heard this, but she did not reply.

“And I’m going to love you,” the girl continued. “Oh, so much! You’re tired of society gabble and gossip; you’re tired of spending on yourself the money you never earned; you’re not a bit of use to anybody, are you? But you want to be. You’re a sort of tragedy, aren’t you? Oh, I know. There are just lots of them in high society, just as weary as you. They haven’t anything but money. And they lack the very greatest thing in all of life, the very thing that no amount of money will buy, just love! But, do you know? they don’t realize that, in order to get, they must give. In order to be loved, they must themselves love. Now you start right in and love the whole world, love everybody, big and little. And, as you love people, try to see only their perfection. Never look at a bad trait, nor a blemish of any sort. Try it. In a week’s time you will be a new woman.”

“Do you do that?” the woman asked in a low tone.

“I have always done it,” replied Carmen. “I don’t know anything but love. I never knew what it was to hate or revile. I never could see what there was that deserved hatred or loathing. I don’t see anything but good––everywhere.”

The woman slipped an arm about the girl. “I––I don’t mind your talking that way to me,” she whispered. “But I just couldn’t bear to listen to any more religion.”

“Why!” exclaimed Carmen. “That’s all there is to religion! Love is the tie that binds all together and all to God. Why, Miss Wall––”

“Call me Elizabeth, please,” interrupted the woman.

“Well then, Elizabeth,” she said softly, “all creeds have got to merge into just one, some day, and, instead of saying ‘I believe,’ everybody will say ‘I understand and I love.’ Why, the very person who loved more than anybody else ever did was the one who saw God most clearly! He knew that if we 166 would see God––good everywhere––we would just simply have to love, for God is love! Don’t you see? It is so simple!”

“Do you love me, Carmen, because you pity me?”

“No, indeed!” was the emphatic answer. “God’s children are not to be pitied––and I see in people only His children.”

“Well, why, then, do you love me?”

The girl replied quickly: “God is love. I am His reflection. I reflect Him to you. That’s loving you.

“And now,” she continued cheerily, “we are going to work together, aren’t we? You are first going to love everybody. And then you are going to see just what is right for you to do––what work you are to take up––what interests you are to have. But love comes first.”

“Tell me, Carmen, why are you in society? What keeps you there, in an atmosphere so unsuited to your spiritual life?”

“God.”

“Oh, yes,” impatiently. “But––”

“Well, Elizabeth dear, every step I take is ordained by Him, who is my life. I am where He places me. I leave everything to Him, and then keep myself out of the way. If He wishes to use me elsewhere, He will remove me from society. But I wait for Him.”

The woman looked at her and marveled. How could this girl, who, in her few brief years, had passed through fire and flood, still love the hand that guided her!