"I'm delighted to have it. I saw the original on the other side. And it was good taste of them to give it quietly in this way, too. But there is a sense in which this is quite embarrassing. They will expect so much, you know, and of course I haven't time for this sort of thing now."

"Well, I thought something ought to be done, my son," responded the mother, "so I sent out invitations for the whole school for a reception here next week. That is, I have them ready. They are not sent out, but are waiting your approval. Tuesday will be a free evening. What do you think?"

John Stanley scowled and sighed.

"Oh, I suppose that's the easiest way to get out of it, now they've sent me this. It will be an awful bore, but then it'll be over. I shall scarcely know how to carry myself among them, I fear; I've been out of this line so long, and they fancy me so virtuous." He smiled and shrugged his handsome shoulders.

"But, John dear, you mustn't feel that way. They really think a great deal of you," said his mother, smiling indulgently upon him.

"Oh, it's all right; go ahead, mother. Make it something fine while you're about it. Give them quite a spread, you know. Some of them don't get many treats, I suppose," and he sank down in one of the luxurious chairs and looked about him with pleasure.

"This is nice, mother," he said; "so good of you and father to think of it. I can do great things here. The room is an inspiration in itself. It is a poem in architecture."

Then the mother left him awhile to his thoughts and he began to piece together his life, that portion he had left behind him across the water, and this new piece, a part of the old, that he had come to take up again. There hovered on the margin of his mind the image of the "ladye of high degree," and he looked about on his domain with satisfaction at thought of her. At least she would see that people in this country could do things as well as in hers.

Then by some strange line of thought he remembered his worriment of yesterday about that present, and how he had thought of her laugh if she should know of it. A slight feeling of pleasure passed over him; even in this she could find no fault. It was fine and costly and a work of genius. He need not be ashamed even if someone should say to her that the picture was presented to him by a mission class grateful for what he had done for it. He began to swell with a sense of importance at the thought. It was rather a nice thing, this present, after all. He changed his position that he might examine the picture more carefully at his leisure.

The fire that his mother had caused to be lighted to take off the chill of the summer evening and complete the welcome of the room, sent out a ruddy glow and threw into high relief the rich, dark gloss of the frame and the wonderful picture; It was as if the somber, stone-arched room opened directly from his own, and he saw the living forms of the Twelve gathered around that table with the Master in the midst. But the Master was looking straight at him—at him, John Wentworth Stanley, self-satisfied gentleman of the world that he was— looking at him and away from the other disciples. Down through all the ages those grave, kind, sad, sweet eyes looked him through and through, and seemed to sift his life, his every action, till things that he had done now and yesterday, and last year, that he had forgotten, and even when he was a little boy, seemed to start out and look him in the face behind the shadows of those solid stones of that upper chamber. The more he looked the more he wondered at the power the picture seemed to have. He looked away to prove it, and he knew the eyes were following his.

The rosy glow of the firelight seemed to be caught and crystallized in a thousand sparkles on one side of the fire. He looked in passing and knew what the sparkles were, the fine crystal points of that cut glass decanter. He had forgotten its existence until now, since the day he had had it packed.