"Hireling," suggested her sister.
"It's all the same," continued Bessie.
"Don't you recollect what she said about the hireling shepherd who saw the wolf coming, and ran away? And about Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who laid down His life for the sheep—and about you and me, Polly, being His little lambs? I don't believe that He will let the wolf get in and hurt us."
"Perhaps it has gone away," said Polly.
"No; I heard it last night when the wind was blowing so hard. Teacher said that it always came out at night, or on dark cloudy days. I should not wonder," added she, in a whisper, "but what it is prowling about on the stairs at this moment."
"Somehow," said Polly, after a pause, during which the frightened children had drawn closer to each other, "I often think that it can't be a real wolf."
"You heard what father said about it," replied Bessie.
"But then he smiled, and so did mother."
"Mother did not want us to get frightened," said Bessie. "That was why she asked father not to say anything more about it."
Polly looked puzzled, and proposed that they should go on singing, but Bessie declared she could not sing any more that night, and suggested that they should kneel down instead, and ask the Good Shepherd to be pleased to take care of them and their parents, and to keep the wolf from the door.