“Bessy,” said Cissy in a whisper, “do you think they’ll burn us all to-day?”
“I reckon, sweet heart, they be scarce like to burn thee.”
“But they’ll have to do to me whatever they do to Father!” cried Cissy, earnestly.
“Dear child, thou wist not what burning is.”
“Oh, but I’ve burnt my fingers before now,” said Cissy, with an air of extensive experience which would have suited an old woman. “It’s not proper pleasant: but the worst’s afterwards, and there wouldn’t be any afterwards, would there? It would be Heaven afterwards, wouldn’t it? I don’t see that there’s so much to be ’feared of in being burnt. If they didn’t burn me, and did Will and Baby, and—and Father”—and Cissy’s voice faltered, and she began to sob—“that would be dreadful—dreadful! O Bessy, won’t you ask God not to give them leave? They couldn’t, could they, unless He did?”
“Nay, dear heart, not unless He did,” answered Elizabeth, feeling her own courage strengthened by the child’s faith.
“Then if you and I both ask Him very hard,—O Bessy! don’t you think He will?”
Before Elizabeth could answer, Johnson said—“I wouldn’t, Cis.”
“You wouldn’t, Father! Please why?”
“Because, dear heart, He knoweth better than we what is good for us. Sometimes, when folk ask God too earnestly for that they desire, He lets them have it, but in punishment, not in mercy. It would have been a sight better for the Israelites if they hadn’t had those quails. Dost thou mind how David saith, ‘He gave them their desire, but sent leanness withall into their souls?’ I’d rather be burnt, Cis, than live with a lean soul, and my Father in Heaven turning away His face from me.”