CHAPTER XXIV.

VISITORS.

"AIN'T that somebody at the door, gran'father?" exclaimed Ailie, jumping up.

"See if it be, deary."

And Ailie opened without delay. But there she turned shy, for before her stood a strange gentleman, and on one side of him was the very same little girl who had twice spoken to her in the street, and on the other side of him was Lettie herself, dressed in a warm blue frock, and fur-trimmed jacket, and pretty hat.

"Well, my little woman, is your name Ailie Carter?" asked the gentleman kindly. "Lettie, I think this is an old friend of yours."

Ailie looked very much afraid of Lettie, and Lettie looked hardly less afraid of Ailie, while the gentleman went on, "How is your grandfather?"

"Please, sir, he can't get up."

"Will he let me come in and see him, do you think?"

"Please, sir," repeated Ailie under her breath.

Leveson entered the room, and took a seat on the old rickety chair near the bed. Josie stood close beside him, and Lettie slipped away to Hor, while Job remarked—

"You be mighty welcome, sir."

"Mrs. Forsyth tells me you have not been well of late, Mr. Kippis."

Job shook his head. "Seems to me some'at of a breakin' up, sir. I'm an old man, as you may say,—can look right back to the wars, an' went through Battle o' Waterloo, an' I've had a harder life than some. Not as I've nought to complain of."

"And now there comes a little warning, a little failing, to remind you that the last call may not be far distant," said Leveson.

"Aye, sir. I'm noways loath to go."

"Those are solemn words for all of us, 'Prepare to meet thy God.' To meet Him eye to eye, and face to face. But I trust you know something of that which can lighten even the valley of death," said Leveson, reading the source of that "noways loath" in the calm upraised eyes. "If you have learnt the secret of the Lord's love and fear—"

"Sure an' that I have, sir," said Job, unable to wait. "Haven't I been His humble servant twenty years an' more?"

"But it is no service of your own which can bear you heavenwards. The Blood of the Lamb and that alone can save us from our sins. Our love and service are but the fruit and not the root of our salvation."

"I knows it, sir, but 'tis good to hear it again. Twenty years I've never missed church on Sunday, an' now I can't go to hear the Word, sure 'tis my Master Himself has sent you to cheer me up."

They went into an earnest conversation, Job speaking from time to time, but usually listening, with a smile of intense happiness. Leveson's little Bible came out next, and during the reading which followed, Josie mustered courage to steal away from her brother's side, and approach Ailie. They only stood looking at each other silently, until Leveson had ceased to read, and was speaking again; then Josie said—

"You're not starving now, I suppose?"

"No," said Ailie.

"Were you really starving that day?"

Ailie nodded.

"That was why you could not come next morning, wasn't it?"

"Lettie went 'stead of me," said Ailie.

"Yes, but you know you ought to call her Miss Lettie now, because she is my sister," said Josie. "I am Miss Therlock, and she is Miss Lettie Therlock."

Ailie looked very much impressed, not to say alarmed. They both stood silent, looking at Lettie who was seated on Hor's knee, holding him tightly. Josie felt that it was incumbent on her to keep up the conversation.

"Do you know we are all going into the country next month?"

"Be you?" said Ailie.

"Yes. We halve a house there, and now that Lettie is found, we need not stay in London any longer. Would you like the country, Ailie?"

"I dunno what country's like," said Ailie.

"Why, it's all green fields and trees, and as lovely as can be. Of course I don't mean just at this time of the year, but in spring and summer."

Another pause. "Lettie," said Leveson, turning, "suppose you come here and speak to Job Kippis."

Lettie came slowly, and stood by the bed, her small hand in Job's large one. "Aye, it's a happy little maid she be, to find a home like she has," said Job, smiling, "ain't it deary? An' ye'll love 'em all ever so."

"I likes him," said Lettie softly, with a trustful glance at Leveson.

"Aye, he be a kind elder brother, ain't he? As has sought an' found ye, an' taken ye away from the mire an' misery," said Job. "Beg your pardon, sir, 'tis a way I have o' lookin' at things as pictures like."

"I think it is the Bible way, Mr. Kippis."

"An' she be happy in her new home, eh?" said Job smilingly.

"They 's ever so kind," said Lettie, hanging her head and speaking low. "But I've got to be a lady, an' tis so hard, an' I don't know how."

"Hard to be a lady, ain't it?" said Job. "'Cause ye wasn't bred up to it, no more ye wasn't. An' yon parson, for all his love to ye, can't change your nature sudden-like. Ye'll fit in by and by. Don't I mean that when I says sometimes the Lord 'ud put me in a palace, if 'twas good for me, but I wouldn't be over happy in it. Sure I haven't got palace tastes, nor palace ways,—an' little Lettie's in a grand house, and she haven't got grand house tastes, nor ways neither, eh?"

"She will learn all that by and by," said Leveson, stroking her head. "But I think Lettie's difficulty makes another picture for you if you want one. Do you see it?"

"Sure an' I do, sir. Why, if a man was took right to heaven, without learnin' to have heaven's tastes, he wouldn't be a bit happier nor fitter nor better off than old Job Kippis in the Queen's palace. What'd he care for the singin' praises to God, and livin' for His service, and lookin' into His glory, an' doin' His will? It's dull work he'd find it all,—lest he had the love of God in his heart, sir, an' his sinful nature washed an' fitted for heaven. Ain't it that you meant?"

"Just that," said Leveson. "But very few men realize it, or know that to be taken to heaven, unfitted for heaven's work and glory, would be no boon. As well take a blind man to see beautiful scenery, or a deaf man to hear sweet music, as talk of a man who is deaf and blind to God's love and beauty, finding any happiness in heaven. But you—" Leveson went on after a moment's break,—"you, I trust, are no longer deaf and blind. Heaven will not be to you what our home, with all our efforts, must for a time be to little Lettie."

"Aye, sir, an' I don't think that the river Jordan's far distant neither," said Job. "No, I'm noways loath to go,—save for leavin' little Ailie tossin' about with no one to take pity on her. But I think ye'll be a friend to the poor little lamb, sir."

[Illustration]

[Illustration]