“No, never, never, Mother Haldane! It is thou who hast forgotten Him. He sent me to thee to-night to tell thee so.”
“Gently now, my dear! Keep still. Don’t you use up your bit of strength for a worthless old woman, no good to any body. There ain’t nobody in the world as cares for me, child. No, there ain’t nobody!”
“Mother Haldane, I think Christ cared for you on His cross; and He cares for you now in Heaven. He wanted somebody to come and tell you so; and nobody did, so he drove me here. You’ll let me tell you all about it, won’t you?”
“Softly, my dear—you’ll harm yourself! Ay, you shall tell me any thing you will, my snow-bird, when you’re fit to do it; but you must rest a while first.”
There was no sleep that night for Mother Haldane. All the long winter night she sat beside Ermine, feeding her at short intervals, laying her herb poultices on the poor brow, covering up the chilled body from which it seemed as if the shivering would never depart. More and more silent grew the old woman as time went on, only now and then muttering a compassionate exclamation as she saw more clearly all the ill that had been done. She kept up the fire all night, and made a straw bed, as she had promised, behind the screen, where the invalid would be sheltered from the draught, and yet warm, the fire being just on the other side of the screen. To this safe refuge Ermine was able to drag herself when the morning broke.
“You’ll be a fine cure, dearie!” said the old woman, looking on her with satisfaction. “You’ll run like a hare yet, and be as rosy as Robin-run-by-the-hedge.”
“I wonder why I am saved,” said Ermine in a low voice. “I suppose all the rest are with God now. I thought I should have been there too by this time. Perhaps He has some work for me to do:—it may be that He has chosen you, and I am to tell you of His goodness and mercy.”
“You shall tell any thing you want, dearie. You’re just like a bright angel to old Mother Haldane. I’m nigh tired of seeing frightened faces. It’s good to have one face that’ll look at you quiet and kind; and nobody never did that these forty years. Where be your friends, my maid? You’ll want to go to them, of course, when you’re fit to journey.”
“I have no friends but One,” said the girl softly: “and He is with me now. I shall go to Him some day, when He has done His work in me and by me. As to other earthly friends, I would not harm the few I might mention, by letting their names be linked with mine, and they would be afraid to own me. For my childhood’s friends, they are all over-sea. I have no friend save God and you.”
When Ermine said, “He is with me now,” the old woman had glanced round as if afraid of seeing some unearthly presence. At the last sentence she rose—for she had been kneeling by the girl—with a shake of her head, and went outside the screen, muttering to herself.