Faith sat at the open window of the little tea room, and watched the young moon's golden horn go down behind the earth rim among the purple, like a flamy flower bud floating over, and so lost.
And the three lives gathered in to themselves, separately, whatsoever the hour brought to each.
At nine o'clock Aunt Faith came in, took down the great leather-bound Bible from the corner shelf, and laid it on the table. Glory appeared, and seated herself beside the door.
For a few moments, the three lives met in the One Great Life that overarches and includes humanity. Miss Henderson read from the sixth chapter of St. John.
"Then said his Lordship, 'Well God mend all!' 'Nay, Donald, we must help him to mend it,' said the other."--Quoted by CARLYLE.
"Oh, leave these jargons, and go your way straight to God's work in simplicity and singleness of heart!"--MISS NIGHTINGALE.
"Auntie," said Faith, next morning, when, after some exploring, she had discovered Miss Henderson in a little room, the very counterpart of the one she had had her tea in the night before, only that this opened to the southeast, and hailed the morning sun. "Auntie, will you go over with me to the Cross Corners house, after breakfast? It's empty, isn't it?"
"Yes, it's empty. But it's no great show of a house. What do you want to see it for?"
"Why, it used to be so pretty, there. I'd like just to go into it. Have you heard of anybody's wanting it yet?"
"No; and I guess nobody's likely to, for one while. Folks don't make many changes, out here."
"What a bright little breakfast room this is, auntie! And how grand you are to have a room for every meal!"
"It ain't for the grandeur of it. But I always did like to follow the sun round. For the most part of the year, at any rate. And this is just as near the kitchen as the other. Besides, I kind of hate to shut up any of the rooms, altogether. They were all wanted, once; and now I'm all alone in 'em."
For Miss Henderson, this was a great opening of the heart. But she didn't go on to say that the little west room had been her young brother's, who long ago, when he was just ready for his Master's work in this world, had been called up higher; and that her evening rest was sweeter, and her evening reading holier for being holden there; or that here, in the sunny morning hours, her life seemed almost to roll back its load of many years, and to set her down beside her mother's knee, and beneath her mother's gentle tutelage, once more; that on the little "light stand" in the corner by the fireplace stood the selfsame basket that had been her mother's then--just where she had kept it, too, when it was running over with little frocks and stockings that were always waiting finishing or mending--and now held only the plain gray knitting work and the bit of sewing that Aunt Faith might have in hand.