Sidney took the letter offered to her. It was in Chuckles' best copper-plate handwriting.
"MY DEARE ANT,
"We allways rites home on Sondays. I like my skool first rat. There is forteen boys, witch is all older than me. I have now quite sertenly made up my mind I will never—no, never—be a farmer. Willie Green seys no gentleman is a farmer, and we wud kick a farmer's sun out of our skule. I am going to be a saylor on the sea. Willie is a nice boy; he says you can allways run away and be a saylor; he thinks Nelson did; so please rite and tell me I can be like him. I hope you are kite well. With my best love—
"Your loving
"CHUCKLES."
Sidney had no heart to smile, for Monica's restless unhappy eyes never left her face.
"My dear Monica, such a baby's letter cannot really affect you. Next week you may hear he means to be a soldier. You don't really mean to tell me that this ridiculous letter has any weight with you?"
"Yes, it has. The child is growing rebellious already over my future for him. I know what boys are. I know what my brother was, and Chuckles is just like him. He has never hidden his dislike to farming. I don't know why. And now, as I lie here, I see things differently. It is not a promising profession in England. The least slacking off, the absence of superintendence, and a few mistakes, and the whole thing begins to slip downhill. My farming days are over. I keep repeating it to myself. All my efforts, my successes, have been fruitless. My time, my life, has been wasted, and I am doomed to a sofa and crutches for the rest of my days. Don't express any sympathy or talk religion to me. If you think that disaster and trouble will make me turn to religion, you are mistaken. It never suited me, and it never will. Your nature and mine are utterly different.
"You are fatherless and homeless; I acknowledge the storm has beaten and buffeted you, and you still go about serenely, with a smile in your eyes and on your lips. We illustrate the two builders about whom Chuckles is so fond of talking. You have built on the rock, you say, and your life is still steady, your spirit unbroken, your trust unshaken. I am lying amongst the ruins of mine. I ought to rise up and start building again, this time on the rock, but I won't do it. If I pray at all, it will be to death to come and finish off a useless, broken life. I am vanquished now, with a vengeance. Oh, how horribly cruel life is!"
Sidney listened in pained silence.
Then she put her hand gently on Monica's arm, and said with intense feeling:
"You can prevent my talking to you about the only One Who can comfort you, but you cannot prevent my praying for you. Your illness only makes me love you all the more and long to help you; and if I feel thus, what must God do, to Whom you naturally belong?"
"No more, please," said Monica, with furrowed brow. "Now let us put me and my misery aside for a time, and talk about the advisability of letting this farm while it is still worth its purchase."