Page:The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy.djvu/479

Rh asserted that he over-represented and misrepresented Mrs. Eddy.

After he became his mother's publisher, Dr. Foster had to be in Boston much of the time, and stayed, when he was there, at the Commonwealth Avenue house. In his absence from Concord, one charge after another was made against him to Mrs. Eddy. Pressure was brought to bear upon her from this quarter and from that, and she seems to have realised that her favourite was marked for sacrifice. Dr. Foster relates that, upon one occasion when they were alone together, his mother drew him to the sofa and took his hand, saying despairingly, "Bennie, if I ever ask you to go away from me, do not leave me." She told him that she wanted him always near her, but that "mesmerism" had come between them. Undoubtedly, Mrs. Eddy herself had become somewhat alarmed when she realised what authority she had placed in Dr. Foster's hands; it was quite possible for her to trust him and to doubt him, to want him and to plan his downfall at the same time. The letters which she wrote him after she sent him away have not a candid tone.

Stories kept coming to Mrs. Eddy to the effect that Dr. Foster was short in his accounts, that he had conducted himself improperly with a married woman who had done some work in the publication-office, etc., etc. Finally, in the spring of 1896, Mrs. Eddy took the publishing business away from her son and transferred it to Joseph Armstrong, a Christian Scientist who had formerly been a banker in Kansas. Foster Eddy was now instructed to go to Philadelphia and build up a church. There was already a Christian Science church in Philadelphia, and when Dr. Foster arrived there he found that he had been