ore; so easy comes human fellowship when we
have had a stroke of fortune. When he went again to his room there was
Mary kneeling by the bedside, with her head slipped under the snowy
mosquito net, all in fine linen, white as the moonlight, frilled and
broidered, a remnant of her wedding glory gleaming through the long,
heavy wefts of her unbound hair.

"Why, Mary"--

There was no answer.

"Mary?" he said again, laying his hand upon her head.

The head was slowly lifted. She smiled an infant's smile, and dropped
her cheek again upon the bedside. She had fallen asleep at the foot of
the Throne.

At that same hour, in an upper chamber of a large, distant house, there
knelt another form, with bared, bowed head, but in the garb in which it
had come in from the street. Praying? This white thing overtaken by
sleep here was not more silent. Yet--yes, praying. But, all the while,
the prayer kept running to a little tune, and the words repeating
themselves again and again; "Oh, don't you remember sweet Alice--with
hair so brown--so brown--so brown? Sweet Alice, with hair so brown?" And
God bent his ear and listened.

CHAPTER XXII.

BORROWER TURNED LENDER.

It was only a day or two later that the Richlings, one afternoon, having
been out for a sunset walk, were just reaching Mrs. Riley's door-step
again, when they were aware of a young man approaching from the opposite
direction with the intention of accosting them. They brought their
conversation to a murmurous close.

For it was not what a mere acquaintance could have joined them in,
albeit its subject was the old one of meat and raiment. Their talk had
been light enough on their starting out, notwithstanding John had earned
nothing that day. But it had toned down, or, we might say up, to a
sober, though not a sombre, quality. John had in some way evolved the
assertion that even the life of the body alone is much more than food
and clothing and shelter; so much more, that only a divine provision can
sustain it; so much more, that the fact is, when it fails, it generally
fails with meat and raiment within easy reach.

Mary devoured his words. His spiritual vision had been a little clouded
of late, and now, to see it clear-- She closed her eyes for bliss.

"Why, John," she said, "you make it plainer than any preacher I ever
heard."

This, very naturally, silenced John. And Mary, hoping to start him
again, said:--

"Heaven provides. And yet I'm sure you're