Joel sat down suddenly on a ledge projecting from the stone-wall. "Gone!" he echoed drearily. It was as if he had been starving, and the life-giving food held to his famished lips had been suddenly snatched away. Both his heart and his feet felt like lead when he got up after awhile, and dragged himself slowly along to the carpenter's house.
"'I PEEPED OUT 'TWEEN 'E WOSE—VINES'"
It was such a bitter disappointment to be so near the touch of healing, and then to miss it altogether.
No cheerful tap of the hammer greeted him. The idle tools lay on the deserted workbench. "Disappointed again!" he thought. Then the doves cooed, and he caught a glimpse of Ruth's fair hair down among the garden lilies.
"Where is your father, little one?" he called.
"Gone away wiv 'e good man 'at makes everybody well," she answered. Then she came skipping down the path to stand close beside him, and say confidentially: "I saw Him—'e good man—going by to Simon's house. I peeped out 'tween 'e wose-vines, and He looked wite into my eyes wiv His eyes, and I couldn't help loving Him!"
Joel looked into the beautiful baby face, thinking what a picture it must have made, as framed in roses it smiled out on the Tender-hearted One, going on His mission of help and healing.
With her little hand in his, she led him back to hope, for she took him to her mother, who comforted him with the assurance that Phineas expected to be home soon, and doubtless his friend would be with him.