A BASKET OF FLOWERS.
A WEEK or two passed away. The gentleman did not take the house at
Hampstead, and Christina did.
Old Mrs. Fenton consulted "her Father," as she said, and decided to
come and make her home in the gardener's cottage, bringing with her her
little stock of furniture, her plants, and her washing paraphernalia.
She was soon settled into her tiny home, and after a few days, felt as
if she had lived there for years. Her own fender, table, old-fashioned
chest of drawers, cuckoo-clock, etc., made her feel homelike at once;
and she trusted she had come to a right decision.
One day before Christina left Gower Street, she privately asked Nellie
if she could be spared to help her arrange her house; but Nellie
answered that it would be impossible, and begged her not to put the
question to her mamma. "She would do anything to give me pleasure, and
I would not have her asked on any account."
"If you really feel so, Nellie, I shall ask Ada; for I believe it would
be an interest for her; only, you know, dear, you are my friend."
Nellie smiled gratefully. "No one could be more pleased," she said, and
then blushing deeply, she added softly, "Some day we may perhaps be
more than friends."
"Hush!" said Christina, putting her hand in front of Nellie's mouth. "I
can't have that spoken of."
"We never have mentioned it," answered Nellie, looking up to see if
Christina were displeased; "but I should like to tell you once how
happy it would make me."
"Dear Nellie, I know; but it would not make you happy unless I could
with all my heart?"
"Oh, no!" said Nellie, looking down.
"Then do not talk of it at present."
And Christina gave her a loving kiss, and left the room.
Ada was enraptured at the invitation which Nellie brought for her
that evening; and the only difficulty was how her attendance at her
school could be arranged for. After some consideration, and with many
promises to take care, Ada was to be trusted to go and return daily by
omnibus for the two weeks after her school began; and Arthur willingly
undertook to meet her in the morning, before his own school hours, and
see her safely into the omnibus again after one o'clock.
Ada thought it was very good of her mamma to allow this, and a few days
afterwards packed her box, and went with Christina to "Sunnyside," as
the house was called.
The next day there came, by parcel delivery, about two o'clock in the
afternoon, a basket of lovely flowers from Christina's garden. It was
directed to Tom; and just inside, on a slip of paper, was written, in
her clear hand:
"For my dear little Tom; one of the gifts that his heavenly Father
sends him."
Tom's face, when the basket was opened, was eloquent; but he turned
away and burst into tears. Never before in his life had he possessed
such flowers, and to think they had been sent to him quite overcame him.
When Nellie, with tasteful fingers, was arranging them in all the vases
she could muster, he said to her:
"I should like that little boy, Black Tom's son, to have some of them;
do you think you could take him a bunch, Nellie?"
"Oh, willingly, dear! And what message shall I take with them?"
Tom was silent; and after a few moments he said: "Could you say they
come from a little boy who loves Jesus?"
"Yes, dear, I will; anything else?"
"And say I am like him, but that the Lord Jesus has comforted me, and I
don't mind so much now."
"Which bunch shall it be, Tom?" she asked. She held each in turn where
he could see them comfortably, and he decided on what he considered the
best.
"Then I think I shall take them vase and all," said Nellie, "and tell
him I shall fetch the vase when I think they are faded."
"Yes, do; they will look prettier so. I suppose there will be plenty of
flowers in heaven," said Tom musingly.
"I should not wonder, for trees are spoken of; but I believe, Tom,
above everything else will be the joy of seeing Jesus. It says, 'The
Lamb . . . shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God
shalt wipe away all tears from their eyes.'"
"Yes," answered Tom, looking thoughtfully out of the window towards
the clear sky, for he was lying in the nursery; then turning round
again, "I would like you to go now Nellie, so that he may see them by
daylight."
So Nellie fetched a sheet of silver paper, and standing her vase in it,
lightly pinned the corners at the top, and telling her mamma where she
was going, set forth.
A short walk brought her to one of the "gone down" and
miserable-looking streets which abound in London the moment you turn
out of the large thoroughfares. She went down this, and presently came
to the house she sought. It was not by any means one of the "dens" of
the vast city, but miserable and squalid enough notwithstanding. She
rang the top bell of the four, and in a minute, a woman looked out from
the bottom room and asked what she wanted.
"Do you think I can see Tom Taylor's boy?" she asked.
"He's at home, safe enough!" said the woman, with not unkind humour.
"Go up and find him, miss; you know the room."
"Yes; I'm the doctor's daughter."
The woman eyed the tissue-paper parcel inquisitively, and Nellie said—
"Perhaps you would like to see the flowers I have brought for him."
"Step in, miss."
Nellie entered the dirty little room, and unpinned her parcel on the
table. The flowers, with their elegant arrangement, standing on the
snowy paper, looked strangely incongruous in the untidy apartment; but
Nellie had not brought them in there for nothing.
She looked up in the woman's face, "Who made these, do you think?" she
asked her.
The woman shook her head, then smelt at them, and said suddenly, "Why,
I suppose it's God Almighty?"
"Yes, God Almighty. He gave them to us, and we should all have had
lovely gardens, and every happiness, but for sin; that has spoiled
everything. But, do you know, He has made a way by which we may have it
all again, and that is by believing in Jesus Christ His Son, and having
all these sins forgiven."
The woman looked at the flowers again. "It's a hard world," she said;
"I wish I could think there ever could be anything different."
"There will be for those who will look to Jesus," said Nellie. "Think
over that, will you? And you will find everything will look altered."
The woman glanced round the dingy room and sighed.
"I'll look in again as I come down, if I can," said Nellie.
So she ascended to the very top, and knocked at the door of the front
room.
Tom Taylor's boy might have lived in a very different room from this;
but his father's good earnings were spent at the public-house at the
corner of the street, and the poor little boy often went short even of
the necessaries of life.
Nellie knocked at the door, and a thin, querulous voice bade her "come
in."
She entered. In the room were two small beds, and on one of these, at
some distance from the window, lay a boy of about ten or eleven years.
He was somewhat propped up by two pillows, but still he seemed obliged
to lie very flat. Over his shoulders an old worn jacket was drawn
and buttoned in the front, which did not however hide the soiled and
tattered shirt beneath.
Nellie had been there once before, and she knew the smell of the close
little room; but she came forward to the bedside.
"Tom," she said tenderly, "I have been sent to you with a present."
The boy looked astonished. "For me? Who is it from?"
"It is from a little boy who sent you word that 'he loves Jesus.'"
"Oh!" said Tom; "And what is it?"
Nellie set the parcel on a little table which was pushed against the
side of his bed, and opened it the second time.
The child looked and looked at it, clasping his thin and wasted hands.
"I never saw such beauties, never," he said, and slowly, as he looked,
tears trickled down his cheeks, and ran on to the collar of his old
jacket. And while he gazed at them, Nellie softly and clearly sang
words which melted that hard young heart as much as the flowers had,
and completed the work they had begun.
"The great Physician now is near,
The sympathising Jesus;
He speaks the drooping heart to cheer:
Oh, hear the voice of Jesus!
"Sweetest note in seraph song,
Sweetest name on mortal tongue,
Sweetest carol ever sung,
Jesus, blessed Jesus.
"Your many sins are all forgiven;
Oh, hear the voice of Jesus!
Go on your way in peace to heaven,
And wear a crown with Jesus.
"His name dispels my guilt and fear,
No other name but Jesus;
Oh, how my soul delights to hear
The precious name of Jesus!"
The boy listened to every word of the long hymn, looking at the flowers
till he was too blinded with tears; then he turned away his head, and
hid his face in the sheet. When Nellie had done, there was silence; at
last the boy stretched out his hand to draw the flowers nearer to him.
He bent his head down, and drew in their lovely fragrance, and then
touched one of them tenderly and reverently with his finger.
[Illustration: The child looked and looked at it, clasping his thin
and wasted hands.]
"Did you say Jesus sent them?" he asked.
"A little boy who lies helpless like you sent them, because he loves
Jesus, and wishes you to love Him too."
"I never did before," said the boy; "I always thought it was so
dreadfully hard. But these flowers—" he covered his face again, and
sobbed.
Nellie touched his hand. "The little boy sent you another message, Tom."
"Did he? What?" he answered, wiping his eyes again on the sheet, and
looking up.
"He said, 'Tell him I am like him; but the Lord Jesus has comforted me,
and I don't mind so much now.'"
"Tell him then," said the boy, "that his Jesus has comforted me too;
for though I cry, miss, it's only because I can't thank Him enough for
wanting to save me."
Nellie passed her hand over his forehead, and pushed back the tangled
hair. "I will tell him," she answered very tenderly; "and he will be so
very glad, Tom. But now I must go, and I will try and come to-morrow,
and see if I can make you a little more comfortable."
She made her way down the dingy staircase again, and stopped at the
door of the front room, as she had promised.
It stood wide-open, and the woman came forward. She had been busy while
Nellie was upstairs, and had whisked away many untidinesses, and had
brushed up her hearth, and now stood with a smile of welcome.
Nellie was quick to perceive the change, and said, "You have made it
tidy for me; thank you very much." Then stopping short, in her gentle,
modest way, she said, "There's another visitor would willingly come in."
"Who, miss? A friend of yours?" then guessing from Nellie's face whom
she meant, she sat down in a chair, and exclaimed, "This ain't no fit
place for Him!"
"No; but He says He loves to come and dwell in the lowly and contrite
heart; and if you are sorry for all the past, and willing to take Him
for your visitor, and Saviour, and King, no one will be more glad than
He to come."
"Bless you, miss!" said the woman, wringing her hand hard. "I never
thought of it; but I will do as you say, and the first thing as ever I
do shall be to clean my place up a bit for Him."
Nellie smiled with a glad look. "Ah!" she said. "It's the heart,
remember, He wants."
"I know, I know; but He shall have a clean room too!"
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