"God knows," said Mr. Spelt, whose magazine was nearly exhausted, and the enemy pressing on vigorously.
"Well, that's what I say. God knows, and why doesn't he help it?"
And Mr. Spelt surrendered, if silence was surrender. Mattie did not press her advantage, however, and the besieged plucked up heart a little.
"I fancy perhaps, Mattie, he leaves something for us to do. You know they cut out the slop-work at the shop, and I can't do much more with that but put the pieces together. But when a repairing job comes in, I can contrive a bit then, and I like that better."
Mr. Spelt's meaning was not very clear, either to himself or to Mattie. But it involved the shadow of a great truth—that all the discords we hear in the universe around us, are God's trumpets sounding a réveillé to the sleeping human will, which once working harmoniously with his, will soon bring all things into a pure and healthy rectitude of operation. Till a man has learned to be happy without the sunshine, and therein becomes capable of enjoying it perfectly, it is well that the shine and the shadow should be mingled, so as God only knows how to mingle them. To effect the blessedness for which God made him, man must become a fellow-worker with God.
After a little while Mattie resumed operations.
"But you can't say, mother, that God isn't better to some people than to other people. He's surely gooder to you and me than he is to Poppie."
"Who's Poppie?" asked Mr. Spelt, sending out a flag of negotiation.
"Well, there she is—down in the gutter, I suppose, as usual," answered Mattie, without lifting her eyes.
The tailor peeped out of his house-front, and saw a barefooted child in the court below. What she was like I shall take a better opportunity of informing my reader. For at this moment the sound of strong nails tapping sharply reached the ear of Mr. Spelt and his friend. The sound came from a window just over the archway, hence at right angles to Mr. Spelt's workshop. It was very dingy with dust and smoke, allowing only the outline of a man's figure to be seen from the court. This much Poppie saw, and taking the tapping to be intended for her, fled from the court on soundless feet. But Mattie rose at once from her corner, and, laying aside cuttings and doll, stuck her needle and thread carefully in the bosom of her frock, saying: