Page:The Toll of the Bush.pdf/112

the best. There had been something in her looks at times—he recalled the momentary heart-shock of finding her alone with Mr. Fletcher, almost instantly annihilated by the radiant smile which had welcomed his arrival. If ever there were welcome for a man in a girl’s eyes, it was in Eve’s at that moment. But perhaps it was not the man but the interruption that was welcome. Of course Fletcher was in love with her. Possibly he was on the eve of a proposal at that very instant, and if the proposal were unwelcome anything likely to avert it would have been as radiantly received,—a cow, for example. Geoffrey laughed and frowned at the same instant. He thought of Mr. Fletcher with misgivings. Not that he considered it likely that the clergyman would prove a dangerous rival, but on account of the power he possessed to create mischief if he chose. As it was, there was an element of difference in his relations with Eve which had not existed previous to Mr. Fletcher’s arrival. For some occult reason, the fiercest heart-burnings grow out of and accumulate round a religious disagreement. It would seem that just at that point where reason becomes powerless she makes the most obdurate fight to retain her supremacy. The man who in one breath will tell you that religion is a matter of belief and not of reason, will in the next educe every argument reason can provide to convince you that belief itself is a matter of reason; and thus, with growing anger in its participants, a religious argument will whirl round in a circle like the fracas of a pair of bantams fighting in the dust. Fortunately the religious difference between Eve and Geoffrey had so far been of an impersonal character. What-