hands forth and grasping, almost everywhere, nothing but thin, hard
surface,--she wondered how much of the world was real; how many came
into the world where, and as, God meant them to come. What it was to
"climb up some other way into the sheepfold," and to be a thief and
a robber, even of life!

These were strange thoughts. Desire Ledwith was a strange girl.

But into the midst there crept one comfort; there was one glimpse
out of the darkness into the daylight.

Kenneth Kincaid came in often to see them,--to inquire; just now he
had frequent business in the city; he brought ferns and flowers,
that Dorris gathered and filled into baskets, fresh and damp with
moss.

Dorris was a dear friend; she dwelt in the life and the brightness;
she reached forth and gathered, and turned and ministered again. The
ferns and flowers were messages; leaves out of God's living Word,
that she read, found precious, and sent on; apparitions, they
seemed standing forth to sense, and making sweet, true signs from
the inner realm of everlasting love and glory.

And Kenneth,--Desire had never lost out of her heart those
words,--"Be strong,--be patient, dear!"

He did not speak to her of himself; he could not demand
congratulation from her grief; he let it be until she should somehow
learn, and of her own accord, speak to him.