“And it’s all yours, mother. I was working for you.”
When they entered John Compton’s suite, Barbara gazed about the sitting-room in pleased surprise. There was a change in the room since Bobby’s first entrance there. Most of the photographs were gone, and most prominent of all the pictures adorning the walls was a beautiful engraving of a guardian angel tenderly watching his innocent charge, a little boy, in years and appearance resembling Barbara’s son.
“What!” she exclaimed, blushing prettily. “Do you believe in angels, John Compton?”
“I do! Indeed I do! And I learned that sweet belief from your own little boy’s example.”
“Then,” pursued Mrs. Vernon, “then you must believe in God.”
“Barbara,” responded Compton, with a catch in his voice, “it must have been God who sent your boy to me. He has changed my life. For several weeks, though Bobby doesn’t know it, I have been receiving instructions from Father Mallory—”
“What’s that?” cried Bobby eagerly.
“And to-morrow I am to be received into the Catholic Church.”
CHAPTER XVI
CONTAINING NOTHING BUT HAPPY EXPLANATIONS AND A STILL HAPPIER LOVE SCENE
The hours that followed were given to mutual explanations. Bobby, at great length, related his adventures from the time he was carried away by the breakers to the present moment. Then John Compton gave his version, pointing out that he had done everything to trace up Mrs. Vernon and that from his knowledge of Bobby picked up in the first hour of meeting he had judged that, all things considered, the best way to watch the lad and keep his mind off the sorrows of separation was to engage him in moving-picture work.