"'What time I am afraid—What time I am afraid—'"
"But grown-up people are never frightened," said Christina. "That is one thing that makes me want to grow up quickly; I shall never be frightened then."
"Grown-up people have different fears, little one; but they have them, and I have mine. I have the dark river to pass, and it seems to be coming very near. I shall have to go first and leave my husband, and I'm afraid for him, when he is left lonely and sorrowful. It is good to have a text like that to dwell on. I used to read my Bible when I could see, and oh, how I wish I had learnt more of it by heart! No one reads to me out of it. I seem to have lost touch with it; and my heart is sore afraid at times. Say it once again, dear, in your soft confident voice, and I will repeat it to myself again and again till it sinks into my heart and stays there. You have been God's little messenger to a poor blind woman this afternoon!"
Christina's cheeks glowed and her eyes shone. Was it possible, she thought, that she could be called one of God's messengers? She said her verse again, and Mrs. Bolland repeated it after her.
And then the door opened and Mr. Bolland appeared with the doctor, who was an old friend of theirs, and who was attending the old lady.
He sat down and chatted with them. Christina kept as still as a mouse. She did not heed the conversation until she suddenly caught the words:
"These people don't deserve to have children. One of those hawking pedlars—a regular drunkard—was brought into my surgery this morning. His small girl is a mass of bruises: she confessed that her father had had one of his drinking bouts, and was knocked down by a wagon as he crossed the road; but from my inquiries I should think she had been going about with him in terror of her life. The man is not likely to live, and I said as much to her, but instead of being comforted by that fact, she dissolved into floods of tears, and assured me he was going to be a very good man, that already he was trying hard, and that she had promised her mother to look after him and love him. Some of these wives and daughters are incomprehensible!"
Christina started to her feet.
"That is Susy," she said with conviction. "Is she here in London? Oh, do tell me; and is her father very ill?"
The doctor looked at her kindly. "I can't tell you if her name is Susy, but her father's name is Jack Winter."