Was it that the loss of his gold had left his poor old heart free to love?
Daisy thought so, and the thought made her very joyous. She was feeble still, and could do little except sit for hours together by his side; but often, in her new happiness, she broke into soft scraps of singing, and Isaac's face showed that he liked to listen.
Yet this was a time of grave anxiety to Daisy; she could not at all tell how she and her father were to live thenceforward. His money was gone. It seemed quite a necessity that his house should be sold.
John Davis was now nearly well, and was expected to be out of the hospital in a week or ten days. Mary would have to join her husband then, and everything would rest upon Daisy. She looked too small and frail for the coming burden.
"But it will be all right," Daisy said often to Mary. "It will be all right, Nursie. God will take care of us. If only father loved God, I should not mind about anything else."
Friends had been very kind in helping Daisy and her father through their time of trouble. Gifts of food and of money also had come in repeatedly, some known to Daisy, some known only to her faithful nurse. This, of course, could not be expected to continue always. She had some anxious conversations with Mr. and Mrs. Roper, about her own and her father's future.
One day she was sitting with old Isaac in the parlour, Mary Davis having gone out from Old Meadow for half a day's charing, as she had frequently done of late. Isaac seemed unusually awake and clearheaded this afternoon, and in consequence unusually disposed to lament over his lost gold. Daisy bore for some time with his sorrowful murmurs, and then she drew her chair closer to him, and took one of his aged hands between her own, and said,—
"Father, do you mean to go on always being so unhappy about the money?"
Isaac repeated the word "always," as he was given to doing. "It's gone, Daisy—gone!" he added.
"Yes, it has quite gone, father—every bit of it," said Daisy firmly. "I think God has taken it from you, because you loved it too much."