Daybreak | Page 4

place. There's many younger than me in places already. But if I do not
find a place, perhaps I will drown myself in the river, for I am sick of
life, and I hope you will not think about me, or mind.----KATE
DANIELS."
Mother Agnes' face grew very white as she read this letter--but no time
was to be lost--she sat down and wrote a little note giving information
to the police, and sent it by a servant; and then she went downstairs to
join the waiting children. She tried to comfort herself by thinking that
Kate could not have got very far in so short a time. At the most she
could only have been gone an hour, and surely she would be quickly
found? And yet, strange misgivings took possession of Mother Agnes'
mind.
* * * * * *
Ten days later, a tall woman dressed in black was hastening at early
dawn along the Thames embankment, near Westminster. Mother Agnes
scarcely knew herself, her heart seemed bursting.
It was the old story of the one lost sheep becoming all in all to the
shepherd. The days had seemed months since poor Kate was missed,
and this first news of a girl who might possibly turn out to be Kate, had
made Mother Agnes hurry up to town by the night train, quite
forgetting that she could not disturb St. Thomas' Hospital with inquiries
at such an early hour. So she paced feverishly up and down by the
river-side, thinking. It did seem just what she could imagine Kate doing,
rushing across the road to save a little child about the age of Frances
from being run over, and both children, whoever they might be, were
knocked down by the passing omnibus. They were much injured, and
were accordingly carried to St. Thomas' Hospital. The younger child

was soon identified through her own statements, but the elder one
remained long unconscious. Her dress was very ragged, but her
underclothing bore the stamp of some institution.
Mother Agnes went over in her mind every word of the short report she
had received, again and again.
How strange London looked at this early hour! She scarcely knew it in
the dim grey light, with hardly a sound in the streets, and there floated
into her mind lines of Wordsworth's, written from this very spot at this
very hour, three-quarters of a century ago--
"Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep! The river glideth at his own
sweet will: Dear God! the very houses seem asleep, And all that mighty
heart is lying still!"
But was it all so still? What of the sick in the hospitals, constrained to
watch and bear the world's burdens through the long hours of darkness.
Oh, if she could only pierce those great walls and stand by the bed-side
of the poor girl of whom her thoughts were now so full!
* * * * * *
Even the children's ward in St. Thomas' Hospital looked strange and
un-home-like in that dim grey light. It was nearly silent too, except for
occasional little moans, coming from little beds. But from one bed
there came something besides a moan: a childish voice half whispered
the word "Kate."
"Yes, dear," came from the next bed, in a low voice, "what is it?"
"Do you feel better, dear Kate? and would my doll help you to bear the
pain?"
Kate smiled gently. "I do feel a little better; and I am getting rather big
for a doll. But tell me, what is your name, dear? What am I to call
you?"

"My name is Frances," said the little girl.
Kate shuddered, and tried to turn her head away.
"Is anything the matter?" asked the little voice, as Kate did not speak.
"No, nothing," said poor Kate, not very truthfully--and then to change
the subject--"Where are your people? Where do you live?"
"I have five, up in heaven, waiting for me," said Frances slowly, "and I
live with my aunt. She keeps a baker's shop, and when I am not at
school, I clean the floors, and mind the little ones, and I go to bed when
the baby does, to keep her quiet. And when the stars come out, I lie
there, thinking of my father and our own little ones, and thinking of
Jesus Christ, thinking,--thinking,--longing to see His face."
The great voice of the great Westminster clock at this moment told the
hour. How solemn it sounded in the stillness; even more solemn than
when it speaks out above the roar of London life in the day-time.
[Illustration: The Westminster clock tower.]
"I am going to sleep again now," said the little child. "Good-night, dear
Kate; God bless you, and mind you wake me if