“No, I don’t see as He can.”
“Very well,” said Bertie, with an odd look of purpose on his face, “we’ll sit and wait. You tell me when it’s high tide.”
Upon that level shore each wave seemed to advance upon the last, and the distance between high and low-water mark was very great. As a natural consequence, the turn of the tide was more easily defined along that coast than upon one more steep, and the practised eye of the habitual watcher could distinguish with considerable accuracy the moment at which the tide might be fairly said to “be on the turn.”
The children sat very silent during the space of time that elapsed before this turn should occur. David’s face had caught some of the awe from Bertie’s, and he felt as if an impending crisis were approaching with the advancing waves.
At length David said, in a low voice,—
“It be turning now.”
And Bertie suddenly rose and knelt down, baring his head as he did so, whilst David copied every movement and clasped his hands together, as he saw his little companion do.
Side by side upon the warm sand the two children knelt for many long minutes. A look of awe was upon Bertie’s face. He felt, as he saw the advancing waves gradually begin to retire, as if the great God of heaven were very near to them, looking down from His holy place, bidding the great ocean keep its appointed limits. Surely He must see the two little children kneeling before Him; and surely He would listen to their prayers.
Bertie’s prayer took no articulate form. He could not put into words the strange longing that was in his mind—a longing to be remembered, helped, comforted—not to be left so utterly alone. It was more a cry than a prayer that arose from his heart, and yet he felt that he had been heard.
He knelt for many minutes beside the receding waves, and when he rose his face wore a look of calmness and serenity very different from its troubled expression half an hour before.