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Updated: June 19, 2025
"Your brother! My uncle!" cried Rose, in amazement. "Luke was the oldest of us," said Mrs. Fane-Smith, "then came Jean, and I was the youngest of all, at least of those who lived." "Then I have an aunt, too, an Aunt Jean?" exclaimed Rose. "You shall hear the whole story," replied her mother.
Fane-Smith was rejoicing that so fair a "brand," as she mentally expressed it, had been "plucked from the burning," and resolving that she would adopt her as a second daughter, and, if possible, induce her to take their name and drop the notorious "Raeburn." The relief was great, for on the way to the station, Mrs.
Fane-Smith, with all his faults, had always been well-intentioned, and though frightful harm may be done by people with good intentions, they can never stand upon the same level as those who wilfully and maliciously offend.
Once more his hopes were raised only to be frustrated. He was sitting besides Mrs. Fane-Smith and Erica, and had managed to stem the tide of the botany. The band was playing. Erica, half listening to the music and half attending to his talk, looked dreamily peaceful; surely now was the time!
Fane-Smith; "if you were not too proud to be governed by authority, you would see that precedent shows you to be entirely in the wrong. St. John rushed from the building polluted by the heretic Cerinthus, a man who, compared with your father, was almost orthodox!" Erica smiled faintly.
Fane-Smith looked very uncomfortable, fearing that her niece might feel hurt at the tone in which "He was an atheist," had been spoken; and indeed Erica's color did rise. "Is that Mr. Farrant the member?" she asked. "Yes," replied her aunt, apprehensively. "Do you know him?"
Fane-Smith ceased. "Had you argued with me in former years, you would never have convinced me, your books and tracts could never have altered my firm convictions. All my life I have had tracts and leaflets showered down upon me with letters from pious folks desiring my conversion. I have had innumerable letters telling me that the writers were praying for me.
"You don't have an allowance, then?" "No; papa declared I ought to dress on eighty pounds a year, but I never could make both ends meet, and I got a tiresome long bill at Langdon's, and that vexed him, so now I get what I like and mamma pays." Erica made no comment, but was not a little amazed. Presently Mrs. Fane-Smith came in, and seemed well pleased with her niece's appearance.
As to taking any intelligent interest in the political world, no one seemed to dream of such a thing, except Mr. Fane-Smith, who read the paper at breakfast, and hurled anathemas at all the statesmen whom Erica had learned to love and revere. It taxed her patience to the utmost to sit through the daily diatribe against Sir Michael Cunningham, her hero of heroes.
The last words were spoken with a sort of half-restrained outburst, as if the pent-up passion must find some outlet. Mr. Fane-Smith was startled. He so seldom thought of Luke Raeburn as a fellow-being at all that perhaps it had never occurred to him that the love of parent to child, and child to parent, is quite independent of creed. "But, my dear," he said, "you have been baptized." "I have."
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