Nobody Part 54

"It is the Bible!" said Lois, with so innocent a look of having answered all questions, that Mrs. Barclay was near smiling.

"Do you think anybody ever did live so?"

"Job."

"Did he! I forget."

Lois turned over some leaves, and again read--"'When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me: because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me: and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.... I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame. I was a father to the poor: and the cause that I knew not I searched out. And I brake the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth.'"

"To be a _father to the poor_, in these days, would give a man enough to do, certainly; especially if he searched out all the causes which were doubtful. It would take all a man's time, and all his money too, if he were as rich as Job;--unless you put some limit, Lois."

"What limit, Mrs. Barclay?"

"Do you put none? I was not long ago speaking with a friend, such a man of parts and powers as was mentioned just now; a man who thus far in his life has done nothing but for his own cultivation and amus.e.m.e.nt. I was urging upon him to do _something_ with himself; but I did not tell him what. It did not occur to me to set him about righting ail the wrongs of the world."

"Is he a Christian?"

"I am afraid you would not say so."

"Then he could not. One must love other people, to live for them."

"Love _all sorts?_" said Mrs. Barclay.

"You cannot work for them unless you do."

"Then it is hopeless!--unless one is born with an exceptional mind."

"O no," said Lois, smiling, "not hopeless. The love of Christ brings the love of all that he loves."

There was a glow and a sparkle, and a tenderness too, in the girl's face, which made Mrs. Barclay look at her in a somewhat puzzled admiration. She did not understand Lois's words, and she saw that her face was a commentary upon them; therefore also unintelligible; but it was strangely pure and fair. "You would do for Philip, I do believe,"

she thought, "if he could get you; but he will never get you." Aloud she said nothing. By and by Lois returned to the book she had brought in with her.

"Here are some words which I cannot read; they are not English. What are they?"

Mrs. Barclay read: "_Le bon gout, les ris, l'aimable liberte_. That is French."

"What does it mean?"

"Good taste, laughter, and charming liberty. You do not know French?"

"O no," said Lois, with a sort of breath of longing. "French words come in quite often here, and I am always so curious to know what they mean."

"Very well, why not learn? I will teach you."

"O, Mrs. Barclay!"--

"It will give me the greatest pleasure. And it is very easy."

"O, I do not care about _that_," said Lois; "but I would be so glad to know a little more than I do."

"You seem to me to have _thought_ a good deal more than most girls of your age; and thought is better than knowledge."

"Ah, but one needs knowledge in order to think justly."

"An excellent remark! which--if you will for give me--I was making to myself a few minutes ago."

"A few minutes ago? About what I said? O, but there I _have_ knowledge," said Lois, smiling.

"You are sure of that?"

"Yes," said Lois, gravely now. "The Bible cannot be mistaken, Mrs.

Barclay."

"But your application of it?"

"How can that be mistaken? The words are plain."

"Pardon me. I was only venturing to think that you could have seen little, here in Shampuashuh, of the miseries of the world, and so know little of the difficulty of getting rid of them, or of ministering to them effectually."

"Not much," Lois agreed. "Yet I have seen so much done by people without means--I thought, those who _have_ means might do more."

"What have you seen? Do tell me. Here I am ignorant; except in so far as I know what some large societies accomplish, and fail to accomplish."

"I have not seen much," Lois repeated. "But I know one person, a farmer's wife, no better off than a great many people here, who has brought up and educated a dozen girls who were friendless and poor."

"A dozen girls!" Mrs. Barclay echoed.

"I think there have been thirteen. She had no children of her own; she was comfortably well off; and she took these girls, one after another, sometimes two or three together; and taught them and trained them, and fed and clothed them, and sent them to school; and kept them with her until one by one they married off. They all turned out well."

"I am dumb!" said Mrs. Barclay. "Giving money is one thing; I can understand that; but taking strangers' children into one's house and home life--and a _dozen_ strangers' children!"

"I know another woman, not so well off, who does her own work, as most do here; who goes to nurse any one she hears of that is sick and cannot afford to get help. She will sit up all night taking care of somebody, and then at break of the morning go home to make her own fire and get her own family's breakfast."

"But that is superb!" cried Mrs. Barclay.

"And my father," Lois went on, with a lowered voice,--"he was not very well off, but he used to keep a certain little sum for lending; to lend to anybody that might be in great need; and generally, as soon as one person paid it back another person was in want of it."

"Was it always paid back?"

"Always; except, I think, at two times. Once the man died before he could repay it. The other time it was lent to a woman, a widow; and she married again, and between the man and the woman my father never could get his money. But it was made up to him another way. He lost nothing."

"You have been in a different school from mine, Lois," said Mrs.

Barclay. "I am filled with admiration."

"You see," Lois went on, "I thought, if with no money or opportunity to speak of, one can do so much, what might be done if one had the power and the will too?"

"But in my small experience it is by no means the rule, that money lent is honestly paid back again."

"Ah," said Lois, with an irradiating smile, "but this money was lent to the Lord; I suppose that makes the difference."