Part 13 (1/2)
”Any room on the sofa for a fellow?” asked Hugh.
”Oh, yes! plenty.”
”Sit next me,” said Minnie.
”All right. I say, Agnes, how strange it will seem to have Christmas Day without them!”
”Yes; but we can make it happy if we try,” said Agnes.
”How?”
”By _being_ happy.”
”That's all very well,” said Hugh; ”but then, you know, Agnes, _being_ made happy depends on outward things.”
”Of course it does; and on inward things too. If we have got a well of happiness inside us, it will make everything round us seem bright and beautiful.”
”What do you call a 'well of happiness'?”
”I know what Agnes means,” said Minnie.
”I was thinking then of the day father came home from America--last time; and we had received the telegram that he had landed at Liverpool.
How we all went about singing and happy; how we never thought of quarrelling, but hastened to get everything ready for him.”
”I remember that day,” said Alice; ”it was one of the nicest I ever spent.”
”So that is what I mean by a 'well of happiness;' something which gives us joy, independently of anything else.”
”And what's your Christmas 'well of joy' for this year, Agnes?” asked John with a smile.
Agnes gave an answering smile. ”Oh, John, it is that we are His; that, through the coming of the dear Saviour, we have been given all other blessings--happiness and peace here, everlasting joy hereafter.”
”And you think that ought to make up for all other deficiencies?” asked Hugh.
”If we have _got_ it,” said Alice thoughtfully; ”but sometimes I wonder----” she looked down, and tears glittered in her eyes.
Agnes heard the quiver in the tone, and put her arm lovingly round her sister. ”Is it so difficult to know?”
Alice shook her head.
”He gives the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him.”
The little party were silent; Alice's unusual feeling startled them. The Sunday afternoon was drawing in, and the light fading.
Presently Agnes said, ”I have thought of a little allegory; would you like to hear it? It might help us to understand Alice's difficulty.”
The question did not need repeating, and she began: