Annie Kilburn

"Oh yes; she's an old girl-friend of mine."

"Then you know how enormously clever she is. She can do anything. We want

her to take an active part--the part of the Nurse. She's delightfully

funny. But you know her peculiar temperament--how she hates initiative of

all kinds; and we want somebody to bring Mr. Wilmington round. If we could

get them committed to the scheme, and a man like Mr. Putney--he'd make

a capital Mercutio--it would go like wildfire. We want to interest the

churches, too. The object is so worthy, and the theatricals will be so

entirely unobjectionable in every respect. We have the Unitarians and

Universalists, of course. The Baptists and Methodists will be hard to

manage; but the Orthodox are of so many different shades; and I understand

the new minister, Mr. Peck, is very liberal. He was here in your house, I

believe."

"Yes; but I never saw him," said Annie. "He boarded with the farmer. I'm a

Unitarian myself."

"Of course. It would be a great point gained if we could interest him.

Every care will be taken to have the affair unobjectionable. You see, the

design is to let everybody come to the theatricals, and only those remain

to the supper and dance whom we invite. That will keep out the socially

objectionable element--the shoe-shop hands and the straw-shop girls."

"Oh," said Annie. "But isn't the--the Social Union for just that class?"

"Yes, it's _expressly_ for them, and we intend to organise a system of

entertainments--lectures, concerts, readings--for the winter, and keep them

interested the whole year round in it. The object is to show them that the

best people in the community have their interests at heart, and wish to get

on common ground with them."

"Yes," said Annie, "the object is certainly very good."

Mr. Brandreth rose again, and put out his hand. "Then you will help us?"

"Oh, I don't know about that yet."

"At least you won't hinder us?"

"Certainly not."

"Then I consider you in a very hopeful condition, Miss Kilburn, and I feel

that I can safely leave you to Mrs. Munger. She is coming to see you as

soon as she gets back."

Annie found herself sadder when he was gone, and she threw herself upon the

old feather-cushioned lounge to enjoy a reverie in keeping with the dreary

storm outside. Was it for this that she had left Rome? She had felt, as

every American of conscience feels abroad, the drawings of a duty, obscure

and indefinable, toward her country, the duty to come home and do something

for it, be something in it. This is the impulse of no common patriotism; it

is perhaps a sense of the opportunity which America supremely affords for

the race to help itself, and for each member of it to help all the rest.