“I am sure no one could be kinder than you have been to me,” she said, eagerly.
“But you don’t think it is my way to be kind to people generally; I am not a philanthropist. Is that it?”
Christie looked puzzled and a little anxious. “Nay, you are not to look disconsolate about it,” said Mr Sherwood, laughing. “It is quite true. I am not at all like a benevolent person in a book. I was kind to you, as you call it, first to please my little cousin Gertrude, and then to please myself. So now you have the secret of it all.”
“Oh, but it is true for all that that God put it into your heart to come so often,” said Christie, with glistening eyes. “Your kindness gives me double pleasure when I think of it in that way.”
“Well, it may be so,” said Mr Sherwood, gravely; “but I don’t think it is generally supposed that God chooses to comfort His little ones by means of such a person as I am.”
Christie’s eyes were fixed wistfully upon him again.
“Such as you!” she exclaimed, quite unconsciously, as Mr Sherwood thought, for she said no more just then.
“I was writing to Effie to-day, and I tried to tell her how good you have been to me. But I could not. I could never make her understand it, I know. She would need to see it for herself.”
“My poor child,” said Mr Sherwood, smiling, “do you know you are talking foolishly? and that is a thing you seldom do. You are making a great deal out of a very little matter. The chances are that you do quite as much good to me as I shall ever do to you.”
“Oh, I wish I could think so! If I could get my wish for you—” She paused suddenly.