“Yes, but I have just written to him that if he will rub himself with kerosene he will get well.”
“Uncle Isaac has no further need of anything,” said Mother. “He died last night, little John.”
Mother began to cry again, and there came a lump in Johnny Blossom’s throat. No, he would not cry. Big boys ought never to cry.
“If any one goes straight into the Kingdom of God, Uncle Isaac will,” said Mother.
It was of no use; he must cry. With his head in his mother’s lap he cried hard. Mother stroked his head gently. “Uncle Isaac wished it so much himself, my boy. He was eager to go to God,” she whispered.
“Yes, but it is so sad.”
That afternoon Johnny Blossom sat crouched on the stone steps leading to the road. The fishing rod lay beside him, but he did not feel like going fishing. He sat with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands, thinking of Uncle Isaac. It might easily be that just now, this minute, Uncle Isaac stood outside that great golden gate—the gate that leads into Paradise—and knocked on it. To think that God can hear a man’s little knock. Why, that gate is surely as big as—yes, as the tallest pine tree over there, and all of gleaming gold; and God looks and throws the gate wide open of course, for he sees it is Uncle Isaac. And so Uncle Isaac goes into the Kingdom of Heaven.
If there had only been a chance to thank him for the fishing rod! Johnny Blossom had some thought of asking God to thank Uncle Isaac for him, but he put it hastily aside. No, he was sure that would not do.
Kingthorpe. Oh! he should like less than ever to go there now. Never, never in the world would he enter that grand place again! Miss Melling and Carlstrom might have it all to themselves, for anything he cared.