David Butts seized it, and held on
for life. His wife gladly sewed a bit of it on every garment he
possessed--including his night-shirt--and the result was that he got to
be known at the docks as a steady, dependable man, and found pretty
constant employment.

How far Matilda Westlake was instrumental in this work of rescue we need
not stop to tell. It is enough to say that she had a hand in it--for
her heart yearned towards the nurse, who had been very kind to her when
she was a little child.

Jack Frost and his sons, with their usual presumption, were in close
attendance on the Westlakes when they knocked at David's door, and when
it was opened they rudely brushed past the visitors and sought to enter,
but a gush of genial heat from a roaring fire effectually stopped Jack
and the major on the threshold, and almost killed them. Colonel Wind,
however, succeeded in bursting in, overturning a few light articles,
causing the flames to sway, leap, and roar wildly, and scattering ashes
all over the room, but his triumph was short-lived. The instant the
visitors entered he was locked out, and the door shut against him with a
bang.

"It do come rather awkward, sir, 'avin' no entrance 'all," said David,
as he made the door fast. "If we even 'ad a porch it would 'elp to keep
the wind and snow hout, but I ain't complainin', sir. I've on'y too
good reason to be thankful."

"Dear Miss Matilda," said the old nurse, dusting a wooden chair with her
apron, and beaming all over with joy, "it's good for sore eyes to see
you. Don't mind the child'n, miss, an' do sit down near the fire. I'm
sure your feet must be wet--such dreadful weather."

"No, indeed, nurse,--thank you," said Miss Westlake, laughing as she sat
down, "my feet are not a bit wet. The frost is so hard that everything
is quite dry."

"Now it's no use to tell me that, Miss Matty," said Mrs Butts, with the
memory of nursing days strong upon her. "You was always such a dear,
thoughtless child! Don't you remember that day when you waded in baby's
bath, an' then said you wasn't wet a bit, only a _very_ little, an' you
rather liked it? Indeed she did: you needn't laugh, Master Tom, I
remember it as well as if it happened yesterday."

"I don't in the least doubt you, Mrs Butts," said Tom, "I was only
laughing at my sister's idea of dryness. But you must not let us
interrupt you in your cooking operations, else we will go away directly.
Just go about it as i