If anybody had been looking on with wide-open eyes, it would have been an interesting study in Providence to watch how Bud was led. It was Alice Ansted who had a very little hand in it again, though she knew nothing of it. The "leading" was connected, too, with so insignificant a matter as an umbrella.
Mr. Ramsey had overtaken Louis Ansted in a rain-storm, a few days before, and had insisted on lending his umbrella, and it suited Louis Ansted's convenience to direct that it be sent home by Bud that morning.
Why Alice Ansted took the trouble to go herself to Bud with the order, instead of sending a servant, she hardly knew, neither did she understand why, after having given it, she should have lingered to say:
"I presume, Bud, that Mr. Ramsey can answer all the questions about Jerusalem that you choose to ask."
Now Mr. Ramsey was the dreary minister who seemed to Claire Benedict to have no life nor heart in any of his work.
Bud stood still to reflect over this new thought suggested to him with a half-laugh. He did not think to thank Miss Alice, and yet he knew that he was glad. It was true, the minister would be likely to know all about it, and there might not be a chance to speak to Miss Benedict again, and Bud felt that he could not wait. So, as he trudged off down the carriage-drive, he took his resolution. He had never spoken a word to a minister in his life, but he would ask to see him this morning, and find out about Jerusalem if he could.
CHAPTER XIX.
COMFORTED.
SATURDAY morning, and the minister in his dingy study struggling with an unfinished sermon. Struggling with more than this—with an attempt to keep in the background certain sad and startling facts that his meat bill was growing larger, and that his last quarter's salary was still unpaid; that his wife was at this moment doing some of the family washing which illness had prevented her from accomplishing before, and taking care of two children at the same time; that his Sunday coat was growing hopelessly shabby, and there was nothing in his pocket-book wherewith to replace it with a new one; that the children needed shoes, and there was no money to buy them; that his wife was wearing herself out with over-work and anxiety, and he was powerless to help it; that his people were absorbed in their farms, and stores, and shops, and cared little for him, or for the truths which he tried to present. What a spirit in which to prepare a sermon for the Sabbath that was hurrying on!