CHAPTER XXIV.

A BASKET OF FLOWERS.

A WEEK or two passed away. The gentleman did not take the house at Hampstead, and Christina did.

Old Mrs. Fenton consulted "her Father," as she said, and decided to come and make her home in the gardener's cottage, bringing with her her little stock of furniture, her plants, and her washing paraphernalia.

She was soon settled into her tiny home, and after a few days, felt as if she had lived there for years. Her own fender, table, old-fashioned chest of drawers, cuckoo-clock, etc., made her feel homelike at once; and she trusted she had come to a right decision.

One day before Christina left Gower Street, she privately asked Nellie if she could be spared to help her arrange her house; but Nellie answered that it would be impossible, and begged her not to put the question to her mamma. "She would do anything to give me pleasure, and I would not have her asked on any account."

"If you really feel so, Nellie, I shall ask Ada; for I believe it would be an interest for her; only, you know, dear, you are my friend."

Nellie smiled gratefully. "No one could be more pleased," she said, and then blushing deeply, she added softly, "Some day we may perhaps be more than friends."

"Hush!" said Christina, putting her hand in front of Nellie's mouth. "I can't have that spoken of."

"We never have mentioned it," answered Nellie, looking up to see if Christina were displeased; "but I should like to tell you once how happy it would make me."

"Dear Nellie, I know; but it would not make you happy unless I could with all my heart?"

"Oh, no!" said Nellie, looking down.

"Then do not talk of it at present."

And Christina gave her a loving kiss, and left the room.

Ada was enraptured at the invitation which Nellie brought for her that evening; and the only difficulty was how her attendance at her school could be arranged for. After some consideration, and with many promises to take care, Ada was to be trusted to go and return daily by omnibus for the two weeks after her school began; and Arthur willingly undertook to meet her in the morning, before his own school hours, and see her safely into the omnibus again after one o'clock.

Ada thought it was very good of her mamma to allow this, and a few days afterwards packed her box, and went with Christina to "Sunnyside," as the house was called.

The next day there came, by parcel delivery, about two o'clock in the afternoon, a basket of lovely flowers from Christina's garden. It was directed to Tom; and just inside, on a slip of paper, was written, in her clear hand:

"For my dear little Tom; one of the gifts that his heavenly Father sends him."

Tom's face, when the basket was opened, was eloquent; but he turned away and burst into tears. Never before in his life had he possessed such flowers, and to think they had been sent to him quite overcame him.

When Nellie, with tasteful fingers, was arranging them in all the vases she could muster, he said to her:

"I should like that little boy, Black Tom's son, to have some of them; do you think you could take him a bunch, Nellie?"

"Oh, willingly, dear! And what message shall I take with them?"

Tom was silent; and after a few moments he said: "Could you say they come from a little boy who loves Jesus?"

"Yes, dear, I will; anything else?"

"And say I am like him, but that the Lord Jesus has comforted me, and I don't mind so much now."

"Which bunch shall it be, Tom?" she asked. She held each in turn where he could see them comfortably, and he decided on what he considered the best.

"Then I think I shall take them vase and all," said Nellie, "and tell him I shall fetch the vase when I think they are faded."

"Yes, do; they will look prettier so. I suppose there will be plenty of flowers in heaven," said Tom musingly.

"I should not wonder, for trees are spoken of; but I believe, Tom, above everything else will be the joy of seeing Jesus. It says, 'The Lamb . . . shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shalt wipe away all tears from their eyes.'"

"Yes," answered Tom, looking thoughtfully out of the window towards the clear sky, for he was lying in the nursery; then turning round again, "I would like you to go now Nellie, so that he may see them by daylight."

So Nellie fetched a sheet of silver paper, and standing her vase in it, lightly pinned the corners at the top, and telling her mamma where she was going, set forth.

A short walk brought her to one of the "gone down" and miserable-looking streets which abound in London the moment you turn out of the large thoroughfares. She went down this, and presently came to the house she sought. It was not by any means one of the "dens" of the vast city, but miserable and squalid enough notwithstanding. She rang the top bell of the four, and in a minute, a woman looked out from the bottom room and asked what she wanted.

"Do you think I can see Tom Taylor's boy?" she asked.

"He's at home, safe enough!" said the woman, with not unkind humour. "Go up and find him, miss; you know the room."

"Yes; I'm the doctor's daughter."

The woman eyed the tissue-paper parcel inquisitively, and Nellie said—

"Perhaps you would like to see the flowers I have brought for him."

"Step in, miss."

Nellie entered the dirty little room, and unpinned her parcel on the table. The flowers, with their elegant arrangement, standing on the snowy paper, looked strangely incongruous in the untidy apartment; but Nellie had not brought them in there for nothing.

She looked up in the woman's face, "Who made these, do you think?" she asked her.

The woman shook her head, then smelt at them, and said suddenly, "Why, I suppose it's God Almighty?"

"Yes, God Almighty. He gave them to us, and we should all have had lovely gardens, and every happiness, but for sin; that has spoiled everything. But, do you know, He has made a way by which we may have it all again, and that is by believing in Jesus Christ His Son, and having all these sins forgiven."

The woman looked at the flowers again. "It's a hard world," she said; "I wish I could think there ever could be anything different."

"There will be for those who will look to Jesus," said Nellie. "Think over that, will you? And you will find everything will look altered."

The woman glanced round the dingy room and sighed.

"I'll look in again as I come down, if I can," said Nellie.

So she ascended to the very top, and knocked at the door of the front room.

Tom Taylor's boy might have lived in a very different room from this; but his father's good earnings were spent at the public-house at the corner of the street, and the poor little boy often went short even of the necessaries of life.

Nellie knocked at the door, and a thin, querulous voice bade her "come in."

She entered. In the room were two small beds, and on one of these, at some distance from the window, lay a boy of about ten or eleven years. He was somewhat propped up by two pillows, but still he seemed obliged to lie very flat. Over his shoulders an old worn jacket was drawn and buttoned in the front, which did not however hide the soiled and tattered shirt beneath.

Nellie had been there once before, and she knew the smell of the close little room; but she came forward to the bedside.

"Tom," she said tenderly, "I have been sent to you with a present."

The boy looked astonished. "For me? Who is it from?"

"It is from a little boy who sent you word that 'he loves Jesus.'"

"Oh!" said Tom; "And what is it?"

Nellie set the parcel on a little table which was pushed against the side of his bed, and opened it the second time.

The child looked and looked at it, clasping his thin and wasted hands. "I never saw such beauties, never," he said, and slowly, as he looked, tears trickled down his cheeks, and ran on to the collar of his old jacket. And while he gazed at them, Nellie softly and clearly sang words which melted that hard young heart as much as the flowers had, and completed the work they had begun.

"The great Physician now is near, The sympathising Jesus; He speaks the drooping heart to cheer: Oh, hear the voice of Jesus!

"Sweetest note in seraph song, Sweetest name on mortal tongue, Sweetest carol ever sung, Jesus, blessed Jesus.

"Your many sins are all forgiven; Oh, hear the voice of Jesus! Go on your way in peace to heaven, And wear a crown with Jesus.

"His name dispels my guilt and fear, No other name but Jesus; Oh, how my soul delights to hear The precious name of Jesus!"

The boy listened to every word of the long hymn, looking at the flowers till he was too blinded with tears; then he turned away his head, and hid his face in the sheet. When Nellie had done, there was silence; at last the boy stretched out his hand to draw the flowers nearer to him. He bent his head down, and drew in their lovely fragrance, and then touched one of them tenderly and reverently with his finger.

[Illustration: The child looked and looked at it, clasping his thin and wasted hands.]

"Did you say Jesus sent them?" he asked.

"A little boy who lies helpless like you sent them, because he loves Jesus, and wishes you to love Him too."

"I never did before," said the boy; "I always thought it was so dreadfully hard. But these flowers—" he covered his face again, and sobbed.

Nellie touched his hand. "The little boy sent you another message, Tom."

"Did he? What?" he answered, wiping his eyes again on the sheet, and looking up.

"He said, 'Tell him I am like him; but the Lord Jesus has comforted me, and I don't mind so much now.'"

"Tell him then," said the boy, "that his Jesus has comforted me too; for though I cry, miss, it's only because I can't thank Him enough for wanting to save me."

Nellie passed her hand over his forehead, and pushed back the tangled hair. "I will tell him," she answered very tenderly; "and he will be so very glad, Tom. But now I must go, and I will try and come to-morrow, and see if I can make you a little more comfortable."

She made her way down the dingy staircase again, and stopped at the door of the front room, as she had promised.

It stood wide-open, and the woman came forward. She had been busy while Nellie was upstairs, and had whisked away many untidinesses, and had brushed up her hearth, and now stood with a smile of welcome.

Nellie was quick to perceive the change, and said, "You have made it tidy for me; thank you very much." Then stopping short, in her gentle, modest way, she said, "There's another visitor would willingly come in."

"Who, miss? A friend of yours?" then guessing from Nellie's face whom she meant, she sat down in a chair, and exclaimed, "This ain't no fit place for Him!"

"No; but He says He loves to come and dwell in the lowly and contrite heart; and if you are sorry for all the past, and willing to take Him for your visitor, and Saviour, and King, no one will be more glad than He to come."

"Bless you, miss!" said the woman, wringing her hand hard. "I never thought of it; but I will do as you say, and the first thing as ever I do shall be to clean my place up a bit for Him."

Nellie smiled with a glad look. "Ah!" she said. "It's the heart, remember, He wants."

"I know, I know; but He shall have a clean room too!"

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