in her heart. The fact was, she just simply, without doubt or
difficulty, believed the child. Little Harold Home had brought her some
news. The news was strange, new, and wonderful; she did not doubt it.
Faithful, and therefore full of faith, was this simple and upright
nature. There was no difficulty in her believing a fact. What Harold
said was a fact. She was one of those whom Jesus loved. Straight did
this troubled soul fly to the God of consolation. Her religion, from
being a dead thing, began to live. She was not friendless, she was not
alone, she had a friend who, knowing absolutely all, still loved. At
that moment Charlotte Harman put her hand into the hand of Christ.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

THE CHILDREN'S ATTIC.

It was one thing for Alexander Wilson to agree to let matters alone for
the present, and by so doing to oblige both Charlotte Home and Charlotte
Harman, but it was quite another thing for him to see his niece, his own
Daisy's child, suffering from poverty. Sandy had been accustomed to
roughing it in the Australian bush. He had known what it was to go many
hours without food, and when that food could be obtained it was most
generally of the coarsest and commonest quality. He had known, too, what
the cold of lying asleep in the open air meant. All that an ordinary man
could endure had Sandy pulled through in his efforts to make a fortune.
He had never grumbled at these hardships, they had passed over him
lightly. He would, he considered, have been less than man to have
complained. But nevertheless, when he entered the Home's house, and took
possession of the poorly-furnished bedroom, and sat down day after day
to the not too abundant meals; when he saw pretty little Daisy cry
because her mother could not give her just what was most nourishing for
her breakfast, and Harold, still pale and thin, having to do without the
beef-tea which the doctor had ordered for him; when Sandy saw these
things his heart waxed hot, and a great grumbling fit took possession of
his kindly, genial soul. This grumbling fit reached its culminating
point, when one day--mother, children, and maid all out--he stole up
softly to the children's nursery. This small attic room, close to the
roof, low, insufficiently ventilated, was altogether too much for Sandy.
The time had come for him to act, and he was never the man to shirk
action in any way. Charlotte Harman was all very well; that dying father
of hers, whom he pronounced a