The warmth of her
bed, combined with her great fatigue, caused the tumult of the place to
lull the child to sleep, and the old man was stretched beside her, as
she lay and dreamed. On the following morning her friend shared his
breakfast with the child and her grandfather, and parting with them left
in Nell's hand two battered smoke-encrusted penny pieces. Who knows but
they shone as brightly in the eyes of angels as golden gifts that have
been chronicled on tombs?
With an intense longing for pure air and open country, they toiled
slowly on, the child walking with extreme difficulty, for the pains that
racked her joints were of no common severity, and every exertion
increased them. But they wrung from her no complaint, as the two
proceeded slowly on, clearing the town in course of time. They slept
that night with nothing between them and the sky, amid the horrors of a
manufacturing suburb, and who shall tell the terrors of that night to
the young wandering child.
And yet she had no fear for herself, for she was past it, but put up a
prayer for the old man. A penny loaf was all that they had had that day.
It was very little, but even hunger was forgotten in the strange
tranquillity that crept over her senses. So very weak and spent she felt
as she lay down, so very calm and unresisting, that she had no thought
of any wants of her own, but prayed that God would raise up some friend
for him.
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