Her mother looked up with her bright, still eyes.

"I trust the truth. I know that, however far you go, you'll come back some
day."

"I believe you see all of them--Darwin and Huxley and Herbert Spencer--
coming back," he said.

"Yes, I do."

His eyes smiled, loving her. But you could see it amused him, too, to
think of them, all those reckless, courageous thinkers, coming back, to
share her secret. His thinking was just a dangerous game he played.

She looked at her father with a kind of awe as he sat there, reading his
book, in danger and yet safe.

She wanted to know what that fascination was. She took down Herbert
Spencer and tried to read him. She made a point of finishing every book
she had begun, for her pride couldn't bear being beaten. Her head grew hot
and heavy: she read the same sentences over and over again; they had no
meaning; she couldn't understand a single word of Herbert Spencer. He had
beaten her. As she put the book back in its place she said to herself: "I
mustn't. If I go on, if I get to the interesting part I may lose my
faith." And soon she made herself believe that this was really the reason
why she had given it up.


Besides Connie Hancock there were Lizzie Pierce and Sarah Barmby.