My visitors departed soon after breakfast to-day in a motor-car with the nurse. Mrs Williams is going to the sea for a month to get quite strong so as to be very brave and have the operation. He is really touching, so is she. It seems such a small thing to have done for such a wealth of gratitude, and that absurd £207 will make it possible for her to go to a proper nursing home, instead of the free ward of a London hospital.
I was rather glad to see them go, although I have learned to like them very much. But for six days I have had no letter from Michael, and yesterday the mail brought me one from father which upset me horribly. He wrote:—
'DARLING—I want to tell you something I have never told any one before. I can hardly write of it even after all these years—But I once saw a vision of my Lord.
'That summer, Meg, after you were married, Ross and I were so wretched without you, that we went down to that little house-boat of Uncle Jasper's on the Helford River.
'One lovely evening, after a wet day, I was in the dinghy fishing when Ross came out in the duck punt and said,—
'"Father, shall I go back and fetch our supper: It's too perfect to go in?"
'So he went back in the duck punt and I went on fishing. Suddenly The Man I told you about the night before your wedding sat down in the dinghy, and as I was about to kneel to Him, He said, just naturally, as a king might to any one he'd known for years,—
'"Oh, Fotheringham, a boat is an impossible place for you to be respectful in!" And He laughed as He said, "Sit down."
'And then after a minute He asked,—
'"Any luck?"