Mrs. Silver was delighted with the suggestion, and Mary was offered and accepted the situation. Thus the work went on harmoniously, and a fortnight before Christmas the Home was in a sufficiently forward state to commence operations. I had schemed that the inauguration should take place on Christmas-day, and I proposed that all my friends--the Silvers and their children, Mr. Merrywhistle, Jimmy Virtue, Robert Truefit and his family, and Blade o'-Grass--should spend the day at Fairhaven. It was thus arranged, and this Christmas two years, Fairhaven received more than sixty poor orphaned children, and the good work was actually commenced.
I must mention here that Blade-o'-Grass had lived with Mrs. Silver from the time of Tom Beadle's departure; and on this, our inauguration day, I found her assistance with the children peculiarly valuable.
'This is the anniversary of your wedding-day, my dear,' I said to Blade-o'-Grass.
'Yes, sir,' she answered; 'there are only four years now to wait. Did you know I had a letter last night from Tom?'
'No, my dear.'
She gave me the letter, and I found that it was written--very badly, of course--by Tom Beadle himself. He was learning to read as well, he said in the letter; Richard was his tutor.
'You are getting along also, my dear, with your reading and writing.'
'Yes, sir. It's a good letter, isn't it?
It was a good letter. Everything was turning out as I had hoped. The different life which Tom was leading was having its effect upon him, and he was beginning to look forward. From Richard's letters to me I knew that he had had some trouble with Tom at first; Tom had not taken too kindly to the restrictions of his time which regular labour imposes; but this feeling--the natural result of the vagrant life he had hitherto led--was passing away, and Tom's mind was nearly settled. In his letter, which I held in my mind, there was a message of goodwill to all who had been kind to Blade-o'-Grass.
'Now, my dear,' I said, as I returned the letter, 'I have a proposition to make to you. You have four years to wait before you wish us good-bye, and sail for your new home in another land. What do you say to living at Fairhaven until that day comes? You shall be one of my matrons--I want those about me whom I can depend upon--and I can afford to pay you twenty pounds a year for your services. You will have a little purse to give Tom when you see him, and that will be an agreeable surprise to him. What do you say to my proposition?'