"By no means. I have no thought of being ill," said Mr. Sherwood, cheerfully. "My going is not altogether, nor chiefly, on account of my health. This is the best season for my long-talked-of Southern trip, and I dare say the milder climate will suit me better than the bitter Canadian winds."

There was a great deal more said about his going which need not be repeated. Gertrude listened to all, sadly enough.

I know how it will end," she said to herself; "I shall have to go to school after all."

She thought at first this was her only cause of regret. But it was not. Mr. Sherwood and she had become much better friends within the last few months than they used to be. As a general thing, the lessons had been a source of pleasure to both, and of great profit to Gertrude. In his capacity of teacher, Mr. Sherwood never teased and bantered her as he had been apt to do at other times. Indeed, he had almost given up that now; and Gertrude thought it much more pleasant to be talked to rationally, or even to be overlooked altogether, than to be trifled with. Besides, though he put a cheerful face on the matter of leaving, he was ill, and sometimes despondent; and it seemed to her very sad indeed that he should go away among strangers alone.

'Will you answer my letters if I write to you? Or will you care to hear from me?" asked Mr. Sherwood, as he bade her good-bye.

"Oh, yes, indeed! I should care very much. But I am afraid you would think my letters very uninteresting -such letters as I write to the girls at home. You would not care for them ?"

"I shall care very much for them. Promise me that

you will tell me everything-àbout your reading, and your visits, and about your little brothers, and their nurse even. I think I shall wish to hear about everything here, when I am so far away."

Gertrude promised, but not very eagerly. An impulse seized her to ask him to forgive all her petulant speeches and waywardness, but when she tried to do it she could not find her voice. Perhaps he read her thought in her tearful eyes and changeful face, and grew a little remorseful as he remembered how often he had vexed her during the first months of their acquaintance. At any rate, he smiled very kindly as he stooped to kiss her, and said, earnestly:

"We shall always be good friends now, whatever happens. God bless you, my child! and good-bye."

CHAPTER XIX.

B

MORE CHANGES.

UT I must not linger with Miss Gertrude and her troubles. It is the story of Christie that I have

to tell. They went the same way for a little while, but their paths were now to separate.

For that came to pass which Gertrude had dreaded when Mr. Sherwood went away. It was decided that she should go to school. She was too young to go into society. Her step-mother, encouraged by Miss Atherton, might have consented to her sharing all the gaieties of a rather gay season, and even her father might have yielded against his better judgment, had she herself been desirous of it. But she was not. She was more quiet and grave than ever, and spent more time over her books than was at all reasonable, as Miss Atherton thought, now that no lessons were expected from her.

She grew thin and pale, too, and was often moody, and sometimes irritable. She moped about the house, and grew stupid for want of something to do, as her father thought; and so, though it pained him to part with her, and especially to send her away against her will, he suffered

himself to be persuaded that nothing better could happen to her in her present state of mind than to have earnest occupation under the direction of a friend of the family, who took charge of the education of a few young ladies in a pleasant village not far from their home.

It grieved her much to go. She had come to love her little brothers better than she knew till the time for parting drew near. This, and the dread of going among strangers, made her unhappy enough during the last few days of her stay.

"I can't think how the house will seem without you," said Christie to her, one night, as they were sitting together beside the nursery fire.

Gertrude turned so as to see her as she sat at work, but did not answer her for a minute or two.

"Do you know, I was just thinking whether my going away would make the least bit of difference in the world to you?" she said, at last.

There was no reply to be made to this, for Christie thought neither the words nor the manner quite kind, after all the pleasant hours they had passed together. She never could have guessed the thoughts that were in Gertrude's mind in the silence that followed. She was saying to herself, almost with tears, how gladly she would change places with Christie, who was sitting there as quietly as if no change of time or place could make her unhappy. For her discontent with herself had by no means passed away. It had rather deepened as her study of the Bible became more earnest, and the strong, pure, unselfish life of which she had now and then caught glimpses seemed more than ever beyond her power to attain. When she tried most, it seemed to her that she failed most; and the disgust which she felt on account of her daily failures had been gradually

deepening into a sense of sinfulness that would not be banished. She strove to banish it. She was indignant with herself because of her unhappiness, but she struggled vainly to cast it off. And when to this was added the sad prospect of leaving home, it was more than she could bear.

She had come upstairs that night with a vague desire to speak to Christie about her troubles, and she had been trying to find suitable words, when Christie spoke. Her ungracious reply did not make a beginning any easier. It was a long time before either of them said another word, and it was Christie who spoke first.

"Maybe, after all, you will like school better than you expect," she said. "Things hardly ever turn out with us as we fear."

"Well, perhaps so. I must just take things as they come, I suppose."

The vexation had not all gone yet, Christie thought, by her tone; so she said no more. In a little while she was quite startled by Miss Gertrude's voice, it was so changed, as she said:

"All day long this has been running in my mind: "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst.' What does it mean ?"

"Jesus said it to the woman at the well," said Christie. And she added: "But the water that I shall give him shall be in him as a well of water springing up to everlasting life.""

"What does it mean, do you thirst ?'"

think-' shall never

Christie hesitated. Of late their talks had not always been pleasant. Gertrude's vexed spirit was not easy to deal with, and her questions and objections were not always easily answered.