can I help it, Mr. Richmond?"
Mr. Richmond was thinking perhaps of Fenelon's words: "O how rare is it, to find a soul still enough to hear God speak!" – but he did not quote them to the child. He stood still again.
"Tilly, when one gets out of hearing of those voices, the enemy has a good chance to whisper to us; and he never loses a chance. That was what happened to Eve in the garden of Eden."
"How can I do, Mr. Richmond?"
"I should say, dear, don't get out of hearing of them."
"But, sometimes" – Matilda paused in difficulty. "Sometimes I am thinking of so many other things, and my head gets full; and then I do not know where I am."
Mr. Richmond smiled. "You could not have given a better description of the case," he said. "But Matilda, when you find that you do not know where you are, run away, shut yourself up, and find out. It isn't safe to get out of hearing of the Lord's voice."
"O Mr. Richmond!" said the child. "I want to be where I can hear it all the time."
"There is one way. Don't you know it?"
"No, sir; I don't think I do."
"My dear child, it is very simple. Only obey his voice when you hear it, and it will always be with you. Obedience is the little key that unlocks the whole mystery, – the whole mystery," said Mr. Richmond, beginning to walk up and down again. "When you hear ever so soft a whisper in your heart, saying, 'This is the way,' follow there; and so the Lord will lead you always."
Mr. Richmond went off to his study, but paused again to say, "Study the twenty third verse of the fourteenth chapter of John, Matilda; and take that for your rule."
Matilda went about softly, putting the china in the pantry, making the table clean, hanging up her towel and putting away her tub. Just as she had finished, Mr. Richmond opened the door. He had his hat and great coat on.
"Tilly, look after my fire, will you?" he said. "I shall be gone some time probably."
CHAPTER II
Matilda went to the study. It was in winter trim now. The red curtains fell over the windows; a carpet had replaced or covered the summer mat; the lamp was lighted, but burned low; and a fire of nut wood sticks blazed and crackled softly in the chimney. The whole room was sweet with the smell of it. Matilda sat down on the rug in front of the blaze; but she was hardly there when she heard the front door open and Norton come in. So she called him to the study.
"Is the dominie gone out?" said Norton, as he entered Mr. Richmond's sanctum.
"Gone out for a good while, he said. You and I have got to take care of the fire." And Matilda threw herself down on the rug again.
"This is jolly," said Norton.
"Isn't it?" said Matilda. "It is so nice here. And do you smell, Norton, how sweet it is with the hickory wood?"
"That isn't hickory," said Norton. "It's oak."
"Part of it is hickory, Norton, I know. But I suppose oak is sweet."
"I think everything is sweet to you," said Norton.
"I do think it is," said Matilda. "Everything is to-night, I am sure. Everything. Isn't this just as pleasant as it can be?"
"It's jolly," said Norton. "Let's have on another stick. Now we can think and talk what we will do."
"What we will do, Norton?" Matilda repeated.
"Yes. We've got no end of things to do. Why, now we can do what we like, Pink. You aren't going away any more; and we can just lay our plans in comfort."
"I didn't know we had any plans to lay," said Matilda. She looked as if the present was good enough. The firelight shone on a little figure and face of most utter contentment, there down on the rug; a soft little head, a very gentle face, but alive with pleasant thoughts.
"We want to get home now," continued Norton.
"But it is pleasant here, too. O Norton!" Matilda broke out suddenly, "you don't know how pleasant! Now I can take the good of it. I did before, in a way; but then I was always thinking it would maybe stop to-morrow. Now it will never stop; I am so glad!"
"What will never stop?"
"O I don't know. It seems to me my happiness will never stop. You don't know anything about it, Norton. To think I am not to go back to that old life again – I was afraid of it every day; and now to-night at tea, and now, I am as happy as I can be. I can't think of it enough."
"Of what, Pink?"
"Of that. That I am not to go back to aunt Candy any more."
"What do you think of where you are going?" asked Norton a little jealously. But his face cleared the next instant.
"Norton," said Matilda, "I can't think of it, – not yet. It is too good to think of all at once. I have to take part at a time. If I did think of it, I don't know but it would seem too good to be true."
"Well it isn't," said Norton. "Now Pink, we'll fix those hyacinth and tulip beds all right. You haven't chosen your bulbs yet. And then, when we have planted our bulbs – I hope it is not too late yet, but I declare I don't know! – perhaps we'll leave the winter to take care of them, and we'll go off to New York till spring. How would you like that?"
"I don't care where I go," said Matilda, – "with you and Mrs. Laval."
"You never saw New York, did you?"
"No, never. Is it pleasanter than Briery Bank, Norton?"
"Well, not when the tulips are out, perhaps; but in the cold weather it's jolly enough. It's queer, though."
"Queer?" repeated Matilda curiously.
"I wonder if you wouldn't think so," said Norton. "I don't mean New York, you know; that's all right; but our house."
"I didn't know you had a house in New York," said Matilda.
"No, of course not; how should you? but now it's different. Pink, it is very jolly!" said Norton, quitting his seat in the chimney corner and coming down on the rug beside Matilda. "That's a good fire to roast chestnuts."
"Is it? but we haven't any chestnuts to roast," said Matilda.
"That's another thing you don't know," said Norton. "We've got a lot of chestnuts, – splendid ones, too. I'll fetch 'em, and we'll roast some. It's the very best way."
Norton went off for a basket, which proved to be full of brown, plump chestnuts, large and shining as they should be. Sitting down upon the rug again he began to prepare some for roasting, by cutting a small bit off one corner. Matilda picked up these bits of skin and threw them into the fire as fast as they were cut.
"Never mind," said Norton. "We'll sweep 'em up in a heap at the end, and make one job of it."
"But Mr. Richmond might come in."
"Well, – he has seen chestnuts before," said Norton coolly.
"I don't believe he has seen people cutting and roasting them in his study, though."
