Part 28 (2/2)

Though dear Aunt Winnie has dropped at least ten years of her life, and old Neb's whale oil has done more for her rheumatism than all the store medicines she ever tried; though more joy and comfort has come into these sunset years than she ever dared hope, she still sits on her little porch in the evening, with a look in her old eyes that tells she is dreaming.

”What do you see, Aunt Win?” asked Dan one evening as after a tough pull up the Hill of Knowledge, he bounded up the Mulligan stairs to drop at her feet and lay his head in her lap.

”Sure it's not for an old woman to spake, Danny dear!” she answered again as of old. ”It's too great, too high. What was it that holy saint, Father Mack, said to you, alanna? Sometimes I forget the words.”

”That it would be a hard climb for me against winds and storms,” said Dan.

”And, golly, it will! I am finding that out myself, Aunt Win.”

”Go on, lad! There was more,--there was more,” said the old woman, eagerly.

After a moment's pause, Dan added, in a voice that had grown low and reverent:

”That G.o.d was calling me to His own. And, Aunt Win,--Aunt Win” (there was a new light in the blue eyes uplifted to her face), ”I am finding that out, too.”

But it is a long way to the starlit heights of Aunt Winnie's dream,--a long, hard way, as Danny knows. We leave him climbing st.u.r.dily on over its rocky steeps and sunlit stretches, but finding many a sunlit resting place on the way. Brightest of all these to Danny is Killykinick, where he goes every summer to spend a happy holiday,--to boat, to swim, to fish, to be ”matey” again with the two old men, who look for his coming as the joy of the year.

”It's hurrah! hurrah, Aunt Win!” he wrote jubilantly one glad summer day.

”Your Danny is at work before time, doing a little missionary business already. Two real true converts, Aunt Win,--baptized yesterday! It was the 'Padre's preaching' that set Jeb thinking first, and then he got hold of some of Great-uncle Joe's books. I sort of took a hand, and altogether we've got the dear old chaps into the fold. Peter and Andrew,--they chose the names themselves, even good old Neb's dull wits seeming to wake at his Master's call. Brother Bart's prayers for his old friends have been answered. The Light is s.h.i.+ning on Killykinick, Aunt Win,--the Light is s.h.i.+ning on Killykinick!”

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