CHAPTER VIII.

TRUE TO HER PLEDGE.

DILLY sat still with her book, a little sorrowful; it seemed to her that she needed some help, though she hardly knew what, and Mr. Hart did not seem to be the person to help her. Effie was very busy just then, gathering all the bright flowers within her reach and carefully pulling them to bits, so she gave no trouble beyond an occasional glance, and left Dilly to her own thoughts. What should she decide? It seemed to her that somebody stood near at hand, waiting for what she was going to say. For some reason which she did not understand, Mr. Hart had discouraged her; made her feel that the whole question was beyond her; that she was too young to busy her mind with it; he had not said so in words, but he had contrived to make her feel that he thought so. Dilly was sure this was very different from what the morning teacher of the children had tried to do.

"And if they are old enough," said Dilly, "then I was, years and years ago; and I've been 'called' a great many times; yet I can't seem to decide that I shall do any differently from what I have always been doing."

A step sounded near her, and glancing up, Dilly saw the artist almost at her side, looking down on her with a good-natured smile. "What kind of a growth is this, which I have found," he said, whimsically. "Is it a flower, or a weed?" and he dropped himself beside her.

Dilly looked around for the growth which he meant. There was no flower near her.

"Oh! I meant this one," he said, touching lightly the hand which lay on her open Bible.

"Oh!" said Dilly, flushing up to her temples. "I'm afraid it is a weed."

"You don't say! Not poisonous, I hope!" and he drew away his hand in pretended alarm.

Dilly laughed a little; she had never heard such queer talk.

She stole a shy glance at her visitor, but he seemed to have already forgotten her, and lay looking up at the pure blue sky. Something in his face made her think he could help her if he chose; but she felt afraid to speak. At last, her voice very soft and low, broke the quiet: "I saw your picture this morning."

"My picture? Did I make a picture this morning? When was it? In my dreams? I'm always making them, asleep or awake; so of course I can't remember them all."

"But I mean the one you made at the tabernacle for the Sunday-school."

"The Sunday-school lesson! Did I go to Sunday-school? Let me see. O yes! I remember; you saw my desert, and my tree that grew and grew, and blossomed at last into a cross which stretched out its arms to reach all the world. Yes; that is a wonderful Sunday-school lesson. You saw the picture; but the question is, did you stand close to it, right under the spreading branches of the tree, where those stand who have gone close enough to use its leaves for themselves?"

"I'm only a little girl," said Dilly, very softly. "I think maybe I'm too young to really 'belong,' yet awhile."

"Well, now, let us see about that. If you were a rosebud, and I was a wonderful fairy who could change you so that your leaves would never fade, and fit you to blossom in the palace of my king, and I wanted to do it, do you think I would like to have you wait until a little worm which had made its nest in your heart, had eaten a great many of your leaves, and curled some of them up, and torn one off here and there, and made you look yellow and ugly, before you came to me for help?"

"No, sir," said Dilly, promptly enough, but smiling again; "who ever heard so strange a story as this?"

"Very well; you are just a bud now, but there is a little worm named 'sin,' crawling about, longing to get a good hold on you. I don't see the use of waiting till he has spoiled your beauty. Do you?"

But now Dilly had no answer ready; something in the voice, or in the words, had sent a sudden rush of tears to her eyes, and a great longing into her heart to be shielded now and forever from the power of that destroying worm.

The artist said no more to her, but gave undivided attention to Effie for the next five minutes, then went away with a kind good-by.

Effie was tired of her flowers now, and missed her new friend whose attentions had been delightful; so she travelled over to Dilly and insisted on being noticed.

Dilly hurriedly dried her eyes, kissed Effie, picked up her Bible, and taking the child by the hand, started for the hotel; the supper bell was ringing. As she went, she said firmly to herself: "Now I have decided; I'm going to Him this very day. I shall not wait until I am an old spoiled flower, with the leaves dropping off!"

True to her pledge, the first moment she had to herself, she knelt down in the little curtained room by her cot bed, and said,—

"Jesus Christ, I gave myself to thee, to do just what thou dost tell me."

She had not time for a word more, for Mrs. Hammond called her just then, and she hopped up quickly and ran away, feeling that she ought to go when called, but feeling sorry, nevertheless, that she could not say those other words which were in her heart. For the next hour or two she was kept quite busy, and it was not until Effie was asleep in her crib, with Mrs. Hammond sitting beside her, and the bells ringing for evening service, that Dilly's work for the day was done. Even then she lingered, looping the curtain a little differently and picking a bit of paper from the matting on the floor; Mrs. Hammond looked so very sad and desolate that Dilly could not feel willing to leave her alone, much as she wanted to be by herself for a little while.

She ventured a suggestion: "Mrs. Hammond, wouldn't you like to have me stay with Miss Effie and you go out to the meeting? It is such pretty moonlight, and the bell sounds so sweet."

"No," said Mrs. Hammond, with a long-drawn sigh; "I could not go alone, and besides, I have not the energy to go anywhere. I just want to stay by my baby; I want to enjoy her, Dilly, while she is a baby. Sometimes, when babies grow up, they give their mothers very sorrowful hearts, though I think you were always good to your mother, Dilly."

This last was added in a kind voice, because of a sudden remembrance the lady had, that Dilly's mother was gone.

"No, ma'am," said Dilly, her voice quivering a little; "sometimes I wasn't."

But Mrs. Hammond had already forgotten her. She sighed again, and looked out of the window, down the long moonlighted path.

"I suppose you haven't seen anything of Mr. Hart this afternoon?" she asked; not as though she expected any information, but as if she was thinking aloud.

"Yes, ma'am, I have; he was with Miss Effie and me out on the grass back of the tent for quite a long while."

Mrs. Hammond turned quickly toward her. "At what time, Dilly?"

"Why, it was after dinner, a good while after; Miss Effie slept late, you remember, and I had her dressed and out there, for a little while before he came along; I don't know just what time it was."

"Do you know whether it was after the three o'clock train had gone down?"

"Oh! Yes'm, it was; or it was just about that time when he came along. I remember just as he spoke to me I was thinking it was Sunday everywhere but down at the depot, and it was the whistle of the train which made me think of it; and the bell was ringing for the four o'clock meeting when you called me, Mrs. Hammond, and Mr. Hart had been gone only a little while; I remember all about it now."

"What took Mr. Hart in that direction, Dilly?" There was a wonderful softening of Mrs. Hammond's voice, and the lines on her forehead seemed to have smoothed a little.

"I don't know, ma'am; he played with Miss Effie a few minutes, then, when he asked me if the day wasn't long, I said it didn't seem so, and I began to tell him about the Sunday-school lesson, and he seemed to like to hear about it, and asked me questions, and I asked him some." Dilly stopped; she did not know how to give the conversation more plainly; she hoped Mrs. Hammond would not ask her.

"Do you know whether the evening train has gone up yet?"

"O no, ma'am! It doesn't go until after nine o'clock."

Mrs. Hammond sighed again; many of her troubles seemed to have to do with the trains.

"Well," she said gently, after a few moments of silence, "you can go now; I shall not want you any more to-night. And, Dilly?"

"Yes'm."

Silence again; Mrs. Hammond did not seem to know quite how to word her next remarks: "Dilly, whenever Mr. Hart wants you to go anywhere for him, or wants to take you with him to see or hear anything, I want you to be always ready at a moment's notice; never mind baby; bring her to me, or leave her with Jeannette; but do not at any time keep Mr. Hart waiting, or think that you cannot be spared to go with him. That is all."

The shrewd little girl as she went away, remembered that her chief duty in life had been supposed to be to keep Miss Effie out of mischief, and wondered if she were now to try to do something of that kind for Mr. Hart. How troubled his mother was about him! She felt very sorry. What could he be doing which worried her so? He was so kind and pleasant to her, she should think he would be just lovely to his mother.

Very thoughtfully she went to her curtained-in room, her mind full of Mr. Hart and his possible dangers. She was quite alone now, and had leisure; there was nothing to hinder her kneeling down and finishing that pledge which she had been so resolved to make, but, much to her surprise, and not a little to her dismay, she could not be interested in the words she had planned to say.

"I have said it," she told herself; "I put it into that little short prayer; why should I put these other words with it?"

She got down on her knees, however, but her thoughts were so full of Mr. Hart that the first words she said were:

"Dear Jesus Christ, he worries his mother, and maybe he is in danger; if thou wouldst only draw him, so that he would decide not to let Satan manage him any more; he said it was Satan who managed. Oh! Dear Lord Jesus, please manage him thyself."

It was of no use to try to pray about herself, or to think of other words to say than those about Hart; her desires went instantly back to him whenever she tried to add to her pledge, made a few hours before. It was as though she had quite forgotten herself, and had wishes only for Hart Hammond.

The light burned late in Mrs. Hammond's room; Dilly could see it glimmer from her tent window. She herself went to bed, and to sleep, and wakened, and the light was still there. She heard the train whistle, and wondered if Mr. Hart was on it, and if it was the fear of his going, which troubled his mother. She reached up and peeped at the tent next to theirs, where Mr. Hart slept, so that she and Jeannette need not be afraid; but it was quite dark, and the door securely tied. Then Dilly sighed, and murmured the same little prayer,—

"Oh! Dear Lord Jesus, please manage him—"

and fell asleep again.

And Hart Hammond's tent door remained tied all night.