"Good morning, darlings. Come and kiss me. I want to have ten minutes' reading out of what Daddy calls our Order Book for the day. And I want all three of you to come to me every morning at ten o'clock, will you? Where's Noel?"
"We don't know. Is the Order Book the Bible?" asked Diana.
"But that's only for Sunday," objected Chris.
"Oh, no, indeed it is not. But I must have my baby. Ah, here he is! I hear his dear stumping feet."
Up the stairs plodded Noel. He came into the room with shining mysterious eyes.
His mother took him on her lap. His curls were full of cobwebs and his knees and hands very dusty.
"Where have you been, sweetheart?"
"You never tolded me that God was going to live next door to us," was Noel's astounding remark.
"I hope," said his mother gravely, "that God lives nearer to us than that."
"I went down the paff," said Noel in his little breathless way. "I sawed a gate and I went frough, and there was a tiny paff and a wall of trees and anuver little gate, and then one of God's houses like we saw in the train, and it's quite, quite close to us. And there are bumps all over its garden and white stones with letters, and then I opened a very big door and went in."