nreal, to Mrs Dorothy it was the most real thing in all
the world.

Gatty answered her friend's query by a puzzled look.

"It comes in church," she said. "He is in the Creed, and at the end of
the prayers. I don't know!"

"Child," replied Mrs Dorothy, "you don't know Him. And, Mrs Gatty, my
dear, you must know Him, if you are ever to be a happy woman. O poor
child, poor child! To think that the Man who loved you and gave His
life for you is no more to you than one of a row of figures, a name set
to the end of a prayer!"

Gatty was taken by surprise. She looked up with both unwonted emotion
and astonishment in her eyes.

"Mrs Dolly," she said, with feeling, "I cannot tell, but I think
'twould be pleasant to feel like you. It sounds all real, as if you had
a live friend."

"That is just what it is, my dear Mrs Gatty. A Friend that loves me
enough to count the very hairs of my head,--to whom nothing is a little
matter that can concern me. And He is just as ready to be your Friend
too."

"What makes you think so, Mrs Dolly?"

"My dear, He died on purpose to save you."

"The world, not me!" said Gatty.

"If there had been no world but you," was the answer, "He would have
thought it worth while."

Gatty's answer was not immediate. When it came, it was--

"What does He want me to do?"

"He wants you to give Him your heart," said the old lady. "Do that
first, and you will very soon find out how to give Him your hands and
your head."

"And will He keep away my Lord Polesworth?" asked the girl, earnestly.

"He will keep away everything that can hurt you. Not, maybe, everything
you don't like. Sometimes 'tis just the contrary. The sweet cake that
you like might harm you, and the physic you hate might heal you. If so,
He will give you the physic. But, child, if you are His own, He will
put the cup into your had with a smite which will make it easy to take."

"I should like that," said Gatty, wistfully. "But could it be right to
wed with my Lord Polesworth, when I could not love nor honour him in my
heart at all?"

"It can never be right to lie. Ask God to make you a way of escape, if
so it be."

"What way?"

"Leave that to Him."

Mrs Dorothy's little clock struck four.

"I think, if you please, Mrs Gatty," said Phoebe's hitherto silent
voice, "that Madam will be looking for us."

"Yes, I guess she will," answered Gatty, rising, and courtesying. "I
thank you, Mrs Dolly. You have giv