or doctrines. John filled her mind, and she had no room for wondering
about his beliefs; he could believe anything he chose; he was hers,--that
was enough.

She went into her small kitchen, the smile still lingering upon her lips,
and through its open doorway saw her little maid, Alfaretta, out in the
sunny garden at the back of the house. She had an armful of fresh white
tea-towels, which had been put out to dry on the row of gooseberry bushes
at the end of the garden, and was coming up the path, singing cheerily,
with all the force of her strong young lungs. Helen caught the words as
she drew near:--

"My thoughts on awful subjects roll,
Damnation and the dead.
What horrors seize the guilty soul,
Upon the dying bed!

"Where endless crowds of sinners lie,
And darkness makes their chains,
Tortured with keen despair they cry,
Yet wait for fiercer pains!"

"Oh, Alfaretta!" her mistress cried, in indignant astonishment. "How can
you say such terrible words!" Alfaretta stood still, in open-mouthed
amazement, an injured look in her good-natured blue eyes. The incongruity
of this rosy-faced, happy girl, standing in the sunshine, with all the
scents and sounds of a July day about her, and singing in her cheerful
voice these hopeless words, almost made Helen smile; but she added
gravely, "I hope you will not sing that again. I do not like it."