"Oh, she is a dumpling!" said the girl, with all her impulsive enthusiasm.

"Well then, take care and keep her warm, for cold dumplings aren't up to much! She needs a lot of warmth--love, that's what I mean."

"I'll see she has that," exclaimed Bessie, "if my sort is any good."

"All real love is good, my dear, you may be sure of that."

That night as the old mangle started its tune again, these were the words that went along with it. "There, bless me, how that dear Miss Phebe of mine has won those two girls! Why, she'll win them for Jesus yet. I know she will! Yes, I dare say she thinks she's done nothing. How little we can judge of our own work, or, come to that, of anybody else's, either. It's only our dear heavenly Father, who gets such a high view of things, seeing all over and into all the corners, that can really know how we're getting along."

CHAPTER IV

A TESTING TIME

Two years went by, each day filled for Phebe, except the Sundays, with housework, care of the child, and looking after the business. From Monday till Sat.u.r.day she hardly ever crossed the outer doorstep. "It will not be always like this," she said to her sister, who remonstrated with her. "When Ralph has got the business well established he will be able to afford more help."

She often smiled somewhat bitterly to herself over the old dream of helping Ralph in his high endeavours to influence the souls of his fellows, and how she was to accompany him when he went forth to deliver his messages. "Never mind," she would say to herself. "I sell the people tea instead." She often called to mind the memorial-card of "Sweet Liberty," and saw how clearly it had proved prophetic of something she had truly lost. Long ago she guessed who the sender was, for she had found out what a keen reader of character Neighbour Bessie was, and what keen intuitive powers she possessed. Phebe never referred to the card, but she once said to Bessie, "I think you ought to be called 'Prophet Bessie.'"

"If you spell that word 'p-r-o-f-i-t,'" replied Bessie, "mother would say you were out of your reckoning entirely. She would say it would be nearer the truth to call me 'Dead-loss Bessie.'"

"Nay, nay, that would never do, but 'dear-loved Bessie' might." The girl looked at her with hungry eyes, but did not answer.

To be so shut in, so entirely engrossed with affairs purely selfish, would to an ordinary woman have been both narrowing and depressing. "An old woman once lived in the Isle of Wight who had never seen the sea, and there are women living in Swiss valleys who have never watched a sunset. How little such women can know of what the world is like! How narrow their sympathies, and how small their ideas! I am something like them," thought Phebe, "but I'll do my best to get a wider outlook, somehow." So by her chair in a corner of the shop parlour you might always find some paper, magazine, or book she was interested in. During the early months of their marriage Ralph had read aloud to her in the evenings, or she to him, but lately he was far too much engrossed in other things.

No one guessed the bitter sorrow Phebe suffered in thus burying her dreams. Alas, for the graves that are not found where willows grow within cemetery gates! for the flowerless graves we often weep over in our daily life! Yet deep in Phebe's heart was the hope that from this grave would blossom, some sunny morn, a husband's love such as she had dreamt of in her girlhood dreams. It seemed as if Ralph's love was sleeping, but surely some day it would waken. Oh, that G.o.d would teach her how to waken it!

By this time Victoria Mary had a companion in the person of a little brother. "I should like him to be called Ralph," said Phebe.

"I don't care for children to be made gravestones of," replied her husband. "You certainly shall choose one name and I the other, and you can choose anything you like but Ralph."

The young arrival a few days later was described on his birth-certificate as "John Washington."

These two young folks were ever afterwards known as "Queenie" and "Jack." What a lot of bother it would save if parents named their children what they intend afterwards to call them!

"Phebe," said Ralph one evening, "just put your book down and talk to me."

"That will be nice," said Phebe, with a choke in her voice, brought there by a sudden hope.

"Wouldn't you like to travel?"

"I should rather think I would."

"Well then, don't you think the time has come when we might sell this business and start somewhere else? I should dearly like to go to Australia. Will you consent?"

"If you will only wait till father is taken home, I will willingly go wherever you choose."

"But why should we wait till then? The Bible says 'a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife.'"

"Yes," said Phebe, trying to laugh, "but it does not say a woman shall leave her father and cleave unto her husband." Then, more seriously, "Do you think it is right for marriage to break every family tie? Don't you think a child has duties to its parents, however old it may become?

Think how lovingly Jesus thought of His mother, providing as far as possible against her feeling lonely."

"If you are going to preach, I'm done."

"I am not preaching, but I do always like to see if there is anything in the life of Jesus that fits in with my life, so that it will guide me."

"Well, I cannot 'fit in' with this humdrum life much longer, so I tell you that plainly, and I don't mean to, either. If G.o.d calls you to stay here, G.o.d calls me to go elsewhere; so how can you reconcile those two things?"

"But why do you think G.o.d calls you elsewhere?"

"I am not going to be cross-examined like a prisoner," he replied, almost fiercely, and walked away. So the conference came to an end.

About two months afterwards Phebe received a note one dinner-time purporting to come from her sister, saying she wanted to see her at once. As the note was not in her sister's handwriting, and was so strangely worded, she was rather puzzled.

"Who has brought the note?" she inquired of the shopman.

"Some boy, but he has gone now."

"It is strange," thought Phebe; "father must be worse, and she had not time to write herself; yet that is not at all like her."

As quickly as possible Phebe hurried away, to find on her arrival her sister had not sent for her. "It must have been a trick of your neighbour, Bessie, to get you out for a change." And Phebe, thinking that idea was quite likely to be correct, made herself comfortable for the afternoon, knowing that Janie would be sure to keep faithful guard over the children.

It was quite dark when she arrived home, for autumn was fast merging into winter. Ralph was out, but that was no uncommon occurrence. The evening was a very busy one, as the afternoon leisure had caused work to acc.u.mulate. When ten o'clock came, and the shopmen had both gone up to their bedroom, and Janie was preparing to retire also, Phebe began to think it was strange Ralph was so late. Going out on to the front pavement she gazed anxiously up and down the road. Very few people were about, for it was anything but a pleasant night for a stroll--true the moon was shining, but hurrying dark clouds were constantly pa.s.sing in front of it, and a sighing wind seemed to prophesy the near approach of bad weather.

At eleven o'clock she went out again: the clouds had grown larger, the intervals of moonlight were briefer. The wind sighed in a more mournful tone than before, and Phebe shivered, but more through apprehension than cold.

At twelve o'clock she was on the watch again. The night was quite dark.

"He must have missed the last train," she said to herself. "I will go to bed now."

She must have slept for about two hours when she woke up with a sudden start. "Could there be any connection between that note and her husband's absence?"--that was the haunting question with which her mind was filled. "But how could there be?" she reasoned with herself. Sleep was wooed again, but all in vain. Rising and getting a light, she opened a drawer where Ralph kept some of his clothes. It was empty. Another drawer was opened; it also was empty. Then she looked in the cupboard, where his travelling-bag was kept; it was gone.

She sat down to think: then, with startling suddenness, his words came to her mind, "I cannot fit in to this humdrum life much longer."

For the next hour it seemed as if she was utterly alone. It was impossible even to think. She was fast becoming petrified, her very blood was freezing, when her baby woke up crying--and that cry saved her! She picked the baby up and strained it pa.s.sionately to her, the hot tears raining on its little head. The child soon nestled to sleep again in its mother's arms; and then, still grasping her little one, she knelt down to pray. "O Jesus, take care of Ralph! O Jesus, take care of me and my little ones!" That was all she could say. After a moment or so of waiting, as though listening for the answer, she prayed again, and then came the sweet feeling of G.o.d's arms being round her, and she said, in a whisper to herself, "He will! He will!"

She had been out in a dark wild storm, but had found the hiding-place.

The next morning, while sending off some telegrams to places where she thought she could make inquiries without causing alarm, her sister called at the chemist's next door for some medicine for her father, and seeing Bessie just near the parlour-door, thought she would have it out with her.

"Ah! I have found you out this time, young lady."

"I don't know what you mean."

"What has she been up to now?" asked her mother, who happened to be near.

"Oh, nothing to be cross about," she hurried to explain, fearing lest she should get the girl into trouble. "Indeed, it was a little act of kindness she did."