God bless you."

Tessa felt the kiss that accompanied these words down to the bottom of
her heart. No one had ever kissed her before, so far as she could
remember, except her father, and she longed most ardently to be taken
into this home.

Katie followed her to the door and whispered: "Tessa, I shall ask God to
make mother decide the way we want her to. You ask him, too. You know it
says in the Bible: 'If any two of you shall agree on earth as touching
any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them.'" But Tessa did
not yet understand about "asking God." She only stared and bid her
friend good-night.

The next morning as she sat rather disconsolately on the doorstep of the
boarding-house, not knowing exactly what to do with herself, for in
consequence of last night's visiting she had neglected to provide
herself with a new book, Katie came by and greeted her brightly. She
looked so sweet and fresh in her simple Sunday dress that it was not to
be wondered at that Tessa, in her soiled mill-clothes, again refused to
accompany her friend to Sunday-school.

"You shall have my library book, any way. I don't care to get another
to-day, and mother says you are to come round this afternoon to get her
answer."

The book was a pleasant story, and though it lacked the species of
morbid excitement to which the girl had accustomed herself, it filled up
the time agreeably, and gave her a glimpse of a higher, purer plane of
life than any with which she was as yet familiar. Some precious truths
concerning the love of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the happiness of
serving him, were woven into it, and served as the indestructible seeds
which were yet to ripen in the girl's spiritual life. At about four
o'clock she put on her hat, and full of mingled anxiety and hope, made
her way to the corner house which seemed to her so much like heaven.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Robertson had thought the matter over in every
direction. She did not at first like the idea of increasing the home
party, or of introducing into it any element that might prove
discordant. She dreaded to have Katie or the boys come under any
influence that might counteract the earnest, religious training she was
endeavoring to give her children. But there seemed to be nothing
vicious, or even common, about Tessa; she was sweet and well-mannered,
and so friendless and forlorn that it would be a positive charity to
take her in. Then, too, the girl had evidently had no reli