CHAPTER VIII.

THERE IS NO TIME TO LOSE.

I WAS very happy in my new life at Grassbourne. If it had not been for the parting from Salome, I do not think I could have been happier.

I had a very busy life, for there was plenty to do both indoors and out-of-doors; but I am sure we are always happier when our time is filled up with useful work. Idle folks are always in bad spirits.

Every one was so kind to me, that I should indeed have been ungrateful if I had not loved them and tried to please them. Bagot and his wife were father and mother to me. Their cottage was a merry, cheerful place to live in, and it was a great help to me to be with such good Christian people.

Ever since the night of Salome's fifth birthday, when I had brought my sins to Jesus, I had taken Him for my Master, and had longed and tried to live as He would like me to live. And every one and everything at Grassbourne seemed to help me forward in this wish and in this effort.

The one thought with which all their hearts seemed to be filled was this: that Jesus, their Lord, might come at any day, and at any hour, and that they must be ready at once to go and meet Him. The "Rules for To-day" were no dead letters to them; they brought them into daily use in their daily life.

Often have I seen Bagot stop suddenly in the midst of something he was saying, and glance up at the chimney-piece, and sometimes he would say aloud to himself:

"Ah, Bagot, you wouldn't like to be saying that when He comes, you wouldn't."

Or when the clock told that the hour he allowed himself for dinner was over, he would rise, and, pointing to Rule No. 1, he would read it aloud:

"'Do nothing that you would not like to be doing when Jesus comes.'"

"Ah, Jem Bagot," he would say, "you hadn't need be caught a-wasting of your time when your Master comes."

His wife seldom spoke of the rules, but she kept them for all that. I never heard her but once speak an ill-natured word of any one, and then she looked up at the chimney-piece, and I saw tears come in her eyes, as she felt she had broken the third rule on the list.

As for my mistress, I think she lived every day as if it might be the last day before her Lord came. Her life was one long act of loving obedience to the Master; she always seemed to try to please Him in everything she did. The poor people in the cottages round, the sick folks in the little town near, the children playing by the roadside, all knew the sound of Bessie's hoofs on the road, and all of them welcomed the sight of her; for they were sure to get a pleasant word, or a kind visit, or a bright smile from their dear Mrs. Tremayne.

"The Master may come any day," I heard her say once, when some one was urging her not to go out in the rain to see a dying woman; "there is no time to lose."

Over the dining-room chimney-piece there was this verse, which my mistress had illuminated herself:

"The time is short—how short we cannot tell, Or clearly understand; But those who read the King's directions well, Think it is close at hand! Lord, is it so? Then grant that we May lose no time, but work for Thee."

And the same thought which stirred my mistress up to work, was also her great comfort in her sorrow. There was a beautiful picture of her husband hanging in her room, and underneath it, on a white scroll, I read these words:

"O comfort ye your hearts; If ye could only know How few the days Ere that glad day arrives, Ye could but praise! Then wipe your weeping eyes, and joyful say, 'It may be that the King will come to-day.'"

My chief pleasure and delight was in drawing Master Reggie out in his little carriage. Each morning we went together to feed his children, and he soon became almost as dear to me as my little Salome.

Nearly every day he would ask me the same question:

"Peter," he would say, "do you think Jesus will come to-day?"

And when I answered, "I don't know, Master Reggie; we can't tell," he would say, "Oh, I do hope He will come to-day!"

"Do you know, Peter," he said once, "when Jesus comes I shall walk as well as you do, and run and skip and jump! Oh, Peter, won't it be nice?"

And the poor little boy, who had never been able to walk or skip or jump, had tears in his eyes as he said it.

Often he would bring his new Bible out with him, and ask me to read aloud to him out of it. He looked out all the stories about St. Peter, and made me read these to him very often. The story of Peter's walking on the sea was a great favorite of his; but whenever we read about Peter's fall, and his denying his Master, he would take hold of my hand, and say:

"It wasn't you, Peter, you know. You would have called out, 'I do know Him;' wouldn't you, Peter?"

Sometimes, when the days grew damp and cold, and when he could not go out so much or so often, he would send for me to come and see him in his nursery, and would show me his toys and picture-books.

So a whole year passed away, and Salome's birthday came round again, and my mistress was so kind as to give me a holiday, that I might go over and see her. Master Reggie did not half like my being away on his birthday; but he comforted himself with his mother's promise that I should come up to the nursery the next day to see all his presents, and to tell him about Salome.

I went over by an early train, and took them all by surprise. They gave me a warm welcome, and Salome danced for joy, and was delighted with the present I had brought her, a little rose-bush, covered with tiny dwarf roses, and a pot of forget-me-nots. Bagot had given them to me when they were quite young plants, and I had reared them for Salome's birthday.

There was so much for me to tell, and for them to hear, and for them to tell, and for me to hear, that the day passed all too quickly. The parting at night was a little hard to us all, and Salome's tears left my face quite wet, as I hurried away from her down the street, to catch the evening train for Calvington.

All this time I had, by God's grace, kept out of crooked paths.

I had a little room of my own over the kitchen in Bagot's cottage, and I used to get up early, and sit by the window looking out into the little garden, and read my Bible, and pray to God to help me to please Him through the day, and to give me grace to keep the three rules unbroken.

But soon after Salome's sixth birthday had gone by, I began to get very careless about my daily reading and prayer. A lazy fit came over me, and I would lie in bed half awake, until I heard Bagot coming out of the opposite room. He would rap at my door, and call out—

"Only ten minutes, Peter, my lad; you must look sharp, you must."

And then I would tumble out of bed, and dress, and only have time to kneel by my bed for one hasty moment, before it was time for me to go out to my work.

I mention this fact because it throws light upon what comes next. I am quite sure of this, that we are never safe when we are prayerless, and that if, for a single day, Satan can catch us going forth to the day's work without prayer, he catches us at the best possible time for him, and the worst possible time for us.

I think Bagot had some idea that all was not right with me, for he said, suddenly, one morning, as we were walking together to our work in the garden:

"He's a bad soldier, Peter, who goes into the battle with no armor on; he'll come off badly, he will."

"What do you mean?" I said.

"Only don't you ever try it on, Peter, my lad, that's all!"

I thought I knew what he meant, but I did not like to ask him; and for one or two days after that, I got up rather earlier, and gave myself more time for prayer. But I soon slipped into the old careless way again.

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