that--

'Eternal Father, strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave.'

Perhaps of all mankind a sailor has experienced most signal proofs of
the omnipotence of God. Throughout the daily dangers they are exposed
to is the underlying, as well as the overruling, sense of the Almighty
Power that holds the heavens in the hollow of His hand.

The captain knew that his girl was right. What he and she had to do
was simply trust Alick to his Father in heaven.

Then came Ned's missive with its startling news.

'You will go, father, and fetch him home?'

'Yes, yes! If I can find him. Please God I may!'

That same day the captain started for London, and with him went Philip
Price, who insisted on joining in the search for the hapless Alick.
The young tutor had proved himself a very friend in need in 'the day of
trouble' that had befallen the Bunk. What more natural then that he
should persist in helping the captain in what would be a ticklish piece
of work, as both men knew?

Before the two set out, Philip Price brought his mother over from
Brattlesby to establish her in Theo's sick-room. It was not the
widow's first visit to the Bunk. The woman who never had a daughter of
her own found in the serious, gentle Theo a realisation of those
dream-daughters who had never been in real life.

And Theo, on her part, welcomed the quiet, soft-spoken widow--another
bit of Philip Price, so similar were mother and son. It was a relief
to the overwrought girl to restfully watch the household reins gathered
up in other and abler hands than her own. As for the widow, she grew
alert and brisk; so good is a little wholesome activity for others.

'We must have no fretting, no repining, dear Miss Carnegy,' she
persisted cheerfully. 'Your young brother is sure to be found. The
captain can't fail, now he has got my Philip to aid him in the search!'

The widow's text for every sermon was 'my Philip'; and it was one of
which Theo Carnegy never tired, to judge by her intent listening to the
subject-matter it produced.

CHAPTER XVIII

IN MULLINER'S RENTS

It was a hot, stifling summer day, and perhaps Whitechapel never looked
more grimy, more squalid, more sorrowful, perforce from its pathetic
contrast to the summer beauty of the skies.

The pavement was so hot that the heat seemed to rise up, flouting
itself in your very face.

In one particular alley, known as Mulliner's Rents, the heat seemed
almos