Yet the days which followed were anxious ones. There was fear lest the child should slip away from life through sheer exhaustion. She needed the utmost care; and now it was that Miss Burton's capacity as a nurse was fully tested. But for her constant watching and unwearying devotion, Beryl's illness might have ended otherwise than it did. But her governess was ever at hand to administer medicine or nourishment just when they were needed, ready, too, with wise and loving words to soothe the nervous depression which troubled the child, to whom weakness and weariness were such strange experiences.
"Do you think I am really getting better, Miss Burton?" Beryl asked one day. "I feel just as weak as ever. You don't think I shall die, do you? I hope it's not wicked of me, but I don't want to die. I would so much rather get well and live with papa."
Mr. Hollys, who was sitting at the further side of the bed, half-hidden by the curtain, leaned forward and looked anxiously at his child as she said this, but Miss Burton replied cheerfully, "It is not wicked, dear; but only right that you should wish to get well. You are stronger, although you may not feel it yet. You have a better pulse, and there is a tinge of colour stealing back into your cheeks. Yes, you are getting on."
"I am so glad," said Beryl with a smile. "I have been trying to think about the kingdom; but my head is so stupid that I cannot remember anything properly. I can't even say that text, 'Suffer little children to come unto Me.'"
"'Suffer little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of God,'" said Hattie Burton. "Don't be surprised that you forget things, dear; it is always so after such an illness as yours, and you will soon get the better of it, and find everything coming back to you."
"'Of such is the kingdom of God,'" repeated Beryl. "That does not mean that the kingdom is for children only, does it, Miss Burton?"
"No, dear; that would be a sad thing for most of us," she replied with a smile; "it means that it is a kingdom of childlike, true, and loving spirits, and it is only by becoming like a little child that any one can enter therein."
"Miss Burton," said Beryl softly, forgetful of her father's presence, "I wish papa were in the kingdom. Do you think he ever will be?"
There was a sudden uneasy movement behind the curtain.
Miss Burton coloured, and felt herself painfully embarrassed by the child's question; but Beryl was looking at her wonderingly, so she replied in a low voice, "I hope so, dear."