Noll hesitated, not feeling certain that Ned would understand his reason, if he told him, and, looking up at the stars, which had come out in great fleets over the sea, was silent. But Ned got up, came to Noll's end of the step, and, sitting down beside him, said,—
"Now for your reason! I'm not to be put off at all. Won't you tell me?"
"Yes, if you wish very much to know," said Noll, in a lower tone. "I think everybody has a work to do,—a work that God gives them,—and I think this is mine, that he has given me. And I promised always to do his work, and I mean to do it, if I can. Besides," he added, softly taking Ned's hand in his, "it is work that papa would do if he were here, and I know that he, too, would be glad to have me do it. Wouldn't you be anxious to get about it at once, and without waiting for the Culm people to sink lower, if you thought it was your work and waiting for your hands? Wouldn't you, Ned?"
Noll's friend was suddenly silent. It was hardly such a reason as he had expected to hear, and what to reply he did not know. "Noll always was the funniest fellow ever since I knew him!" he thought to himself.
Noll waited, and tried to look into his friend's face, and feared that Ned did not comprehend his motives, after all. At last he said, "Don't you understand?"
"Oh, yes," said Ned, quickly, "but I—well—I didn't know what to say, and, somehow, you make me ashamed. It seems too bad for you to waste—spend, I mean—your money for those fishermen."
"Oh, no," said Noll, "I've no need of it for myself, and if I had, they need it more than I. And, Ned, I want to beg you to help me. Will you?"
"Pshaw! I'd be no help at all!" said Ned; "I'm no good at such things."
"But will you try?" said Noll, eagerly.
"Yes, if you wish. But I'll be sure to bother or make a mess of something,—see if I don't!"