"And there, among the great prisoners of state, he learned to know about the politics of the country, and heard what he never could have heard talked about anywhere else; and there, by interpreting their dreams, he recommended himself to the high officers of Pharaoh. Except through the prison, it is impossible to see how he, a poor foreigner, could ever have come to be so distinguished at the king's court; for the Egyptians hated and despised foreigners."
"I'll be whipped if that ain't a good sermon," said Rupert drily; "and what's more, I can understand it, which I can't most sermons I've heard. But look here,—do you think God takes the same sort of look-out for common folks? Joseph was Joseph."
"The care comes of His goodness, not out of our worthiness," said Dolly, the tears dripping from her eyes. "To Him, Dolly is Dolly, and Rupert is Rupert, just as truly. I know it, and yet I am so ungrateful!"
"But tell me, then," Rupert went on, "how comes it that God, who can do everything, does not make people good right off? Half the trouble in the world comes of folks' wrong-headedness; why don't He make 'em reasonable?"
"He tries to make them reasonable."
"Tries! Why don't He do it?"
"You, for instance," said Dolly—"because He has given you the power of choice, Rupert; and you know yourself that obedience would not be obedience if it were not voluntary."
On this theological nut Rupert ruminated, without finding anything to say.
"You have comforted me," Dolly went on presently. "Thank you, Rupert. You have made me remember what I had forgotten. Just look at that palace front in the moonlight!"
"The world's a queer place, though," said Rupert, not heeding the palace front.