She stroked the hair a moment, and then
turned away.
"Mother, could you stay with me to-night?"
"Why, no, Maggie,--your father wants me to read to him."
"Oh, I know. Did he miss me to-night,-- father?"
"Not much; we were talking old times over,--in Virginia, you
know."
"I know; good-night."
She went back to the chair. Tige was there,--for he used to
spend half of his time on the farm. She put her arm about his
head. God knows how lonely the poor child was when she drew the
dog so warmly to her heart: not for his master's sake alone; but
it was all she had. He grew tired at last, and whined, trying to
get out.
"Will you go, Tige?" she said, and opened the window.
He jumped out, and she watched him going towards town. Such a
little thing, it was! But not even a dog "called her nearest and
best."
Let us be silent; the story of the night is not for us to read.
Do you think that He, who in the far, dim Life holds the worlds
in His hand, knew or cared how alone the child was? What if she
wrung her thin hands, grew sick with the slow, mad, solitary
tears?--was not the world to save, as Knowles said?
He, too, had been alone; He had come unto His own, and His own
received him not: so, while the struggling world rested,
unconscious, in infinite calm of right, He came close to her with
human eyes that had loved, and not been loved, and had suffered
with that pain. And, trusting Him, she only said, "Show me my
work! Thou that takest away the pain of the world, have mercy
upon me!"
CHAPTER VII.
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