My little Sunday scholars were in full force at the church gate as we went through, and irrepressible Roddy darted up to me and clutched hold of my dress,—'You isn't going away to heaven, is you, like Jim?'
'Not yet, I think,' I answered, trying to detach his chubby fingers from my skirt.
'I thought you was, in that booful angel dress!' And he fell back with a trace of disappointment on his rosy face.
Kitty was by his side openly weeping. As I came down the path after it was all over, I could not help giving her a special 'good-bye.' Her sad little face flushed with pleasure as I did so, and she murmured, 'I never shall forget you, teacher, you've taught me to love Jesus'; and my own eyes filled with tears at her words.
As we drove away to the station on our way to the Continent for a month or six weeks, and I felt I was on the threshold of a new life, I said to Philip, 'I feel as if I could put to this chapter of my life, "Not one thing hath failed of all the good things which the Lord God spake concerning you!"'
CHAPTER XIX
OLD FRIENDS
'One in heart, in interest and design,
Gird up each other to the race divine.'—Cowper.
'Hilda, I have an old friend coming to dine with us to-night. I came across him in town to-day; you are sure to like him, he is a general favourite wherever he goes.'