hen
he grows up," Ondrejko said, appraisingly.

"And where are you going?"

"Only up here on the rock to see what is behind it. In our country we
also have a large rock, but much higher and broader, and when you look
down from it it seems as if you look down into Sunshine Valley, as the
story goes. And after the storm a rainbow appears, like Heaven's gate
which appeared once to Jacob in a dream. Once upon a time I believed
that Heaven's gate was only there, but today I know that Heaven is
everywhere open that the Lord Jesus might come to us where and when He
wants to. Do you know Him too?"

"Who?" wondered the boys.

"The Son of God, the Lord Jesus. But I see already that you do not
know Him, and He surely sent me to you, so that I could tell you all
that I know. Do you have time?"

"We can spend about an hour," said Petrik, who felt the new stranger
was very friendly and he would like to have him for a comrade.

"Let us then sit down here on the rock, and I will tell you how it was
that I came to the Sunshine Valley the first time, and what kind of
book I found there. I have it even here with me because I could not
be without it. But tell me first your name. I am called Palko, though
they once baptized me in the name of Nicholas. But this is a long
story."

"My name is Petrik, and he is called Ondrejko. At home they call him
Andreas de Gemer in the Magyar tongue, but Bacha Filina says, 'Why
should we break our tongues with foreign names?' Anyhow, Ondrejko is
much nicer," zealously spoke Petrik.

"That is a nice name. It was the name of one of the disciples of the
Lord Jesus who brought to Him the boy with the loaves and fishes. I
have it beautifully written in this book."

In the meantime the boys climbed the rock, sat down, and the new
comrade drew out a book carefully wrapped up in paper and began to
tell them the beautiful things about it. If one would want to repeat
them it would take a whole book.[A]

[Footnote A: See first part of "Sunshine Country."]

Among other things, he told them that whosoever takes this book into
his hands dare not read it otherwise than word for word, from the
beginning to the end, because only in this way will he get to know
the Way which leads to the true Sunshine Country, where, through the
Heaven's gates, the Lord Jesus went to prepare a place for all those
who obediently went that way.

The boys would not have tired listening till the evening, but suddenly
Fido came,