"And He's always thinking about being kind," said Alice, with kindling eyes. "Don't you remember last week, when I was poorly, and couldn't eat any nice things or fruit for ever so long, how He sent me—told someone to send me—that tiny, tiny little text-book?"
"Yes, darling; I thought so when it came."
"So did I," said Alice, nodding, "because He's so kind."
Eleanor looked on wonderingly, only half comprehending, but still taking in part of the picture into her little mind, and carrying away with her into the garden, whither the children now ran, an impression that "God was kind."
Just outside the verandah—the same old verandah where Nellie used to sit and dream and pray—Tom, little no longer, reclined in an invalid chair. His face was altered from the delicate child's face, but it had the same sweet trustful expression, though he was now a boy of fourteen.
He had been allowed by his physicians to sit up a little every day; but his slight form was even thinner than it had been, and those round him knew that he was slowly but surely preparing to leave them.
He knew it himself, and talked of it peacefully and happily, not as a thing to be dreaded, but as a change from tender love here, to even better beyond.
His patience, as the years rolled slowly on, increased rather than diminished, and the absence of fretfulness, which had once been obtained with great inward struggle, now was habitual.
He and Nellie were the firmest friends and dearest companions; and if anything lightened her cares, it was to have "a talk" with little Tom.
When she was burdened or weary, she would sit silently by him, leaning her head on his cushion, content to be quiet; and often if they did not speak a word, comfort would steal over her. So, peaceful and still, she would remember the patiently-borne suffering of her young brother—the hopelessness of his earthly prospects, the hopefulness with which he regarded his heavenly prospects; and any repining would be rebuked when she thought of how much more enjoyment she had after all, than he.