"I mean to try and think about it oftener, for it doesn't seem as though we ought ever to forget it. Mother says it ought to make us try and do things for Him; but I don't know what I can do, except to love Him, and try to be good. Perhaps till I'm bigger He'll let that count."
"And when you're bigger what will you do, little master?" asked Jim.
Pat sat and pondered the question a good while with his chin in his hand.
"I don't quite know," he answered slowly. "I mightn't ever have the chance; but I think I know what I should like to do if I could."
"And what is that?" asked Jim, with sudden and very evident interest.
"I think," answered the child, slowly and reverently, "that I should like best to lay down my life for somebody else—like as He laid it down for us. Some people have done that, you know—brave men who have died doing their duty—to try and save other people from death. I think God must love them for it. I think Jesus must smile at them, for He did just the same for us; and if He knows that they do it because they want to be like Him and do something for Him, I think He would be pleased. People don't always die because they are willing to; sometimes they are saved too. But Jesus would know that they were willing to die for Him. I think, when I grow to be a man, if I might choose, I should like best to serve Him like that."
Whilst Pat was speaking, Jim's eyes had been fixed earnestly upon his face. Now they roved back again over the sea, and suddenly the man gave a great start. He rose to his feet, and stood looking over the sea, shading his eyes with his hand.
"What is it?" asked Pat, coming and standing beside him, and imitating his gesture. "Can you see anything, Jim? I can't seem to see nothing."
"That's just it," answered the man. "We can't see half as far as we did an hour ago. Seems like as if there was a thick sea-fog coming on. I was thinking only this morning what a time we had been without one. That's a fog-bank and no mistake, and drifting right down upon us, too. I must go and see to the horn. We must start that if it comes over us; else your father might never find his way back—to say nothing of the ships running aground here. You'll hear her voice, and no mistake, little master, before another hour is over; and a mighty queer voice it is, I can tell you. You'll not forget it easy, once you've heard it!"
Pat was immensely interested. He followed Jim up into the upper room, and went out upon the gallery to watch the great fog-bank creep slowly down upon them. The sun was so bright and clear that it seemed impossible that that slowly moving white mass should ever obscure it; but soon a few little light vapour wreaths drifted up against the rocks, and very quickly the sun looked dull and red, and little by little the sky and the sea seemed all to be blotted out, and Pat could not tell which way he was looking, nor where the land lay. He seemed to be up alone in some high place, floating in mid-air, in a world of vapour. He would have been frightened if he had not heard Jim moving about close at hand.