"But how did you find out who she was?" said Mrs. Fisher.
"By the merest accident. But you would never guess, so I will tell you all about it." And he detailed the circumstances with which the reader is familiar.
"Well, if I ever!" grunted Mr. Fisher.
"I'm so thankful, Benny," Mrs. Fisher remarked; "though the finding of the note can make no difference in our regard for you, for we never doubted your honesty for a moment."
"Thank you, mammy;" and he looked fondly up into the face of the good woman who for so many years had been as a mother to him.
After breakfast Benny took a book and went out into the fields to read, but somehow to-day the letters got hopelessly mixed, and all the lines seemed to run into one. He did his best to fix his mind upon the subject of the book, but in vain: before he had read a dozen words the letters would fade away, and his thoughts would be somewhere else; and not only his thoughts, but his eyes kept wandering in the direction of Brooklands, and he found himself weaving all kinds of fancies. But in every pattern stood out the face of one he had never forgotten either in joy or pain. How grandly life was opening out before him again! The mountain heights that had been so long in darkness were once more bathed in light. The wilderness surely lay all behind him now. Ah! he had thought so once before, and had found out that he had only just commenced the journey across the dreary waste. Was it to be so again? Would this glorious morning close in darkness? Were hopes always delusive, and but the prelude of despair? He knew not; and yet he had no fear. "The Lord," he said, "has always provided for me; I believe He always will."
Then a lark rose up from its lowly nest near him, and went singing upward through the sky, and as he listened to the full rich song that floated down to him, he seemed to hear in it the promise of an ever-faithful Friend—"And not one of them falls to the ground without the notice of His eye.... Are ye not much better than they?"
Towards the close of the afternoon Benny found himself in the lane that led down to the bridge that crossed the dell. He had no particular object in view, only he loved a quiet stroll through the country lanes in the quiet of the day, and he was useless on the farm till his arm got better. Below in the valley the river rippled pleasantly over its stony bed. To Benny's ears it sounded like a song, while his own fancy supplied the words—
"There is beauty all around
When there's love at home."
On turning the sharp corner of which we have already spoken, he came suddenly face to face with Eva Lawrence. Benny blushed scarlet; but Eva held out her hand in a simple childish manner, and said frankly,