Hollowmell | Page 3

two worked together, than when they each worked separately, so that they were soon free to settle down before the fire in Minnie's room, and begin the subject which had been on Minnie's mind for almost four days now.
"Well, Minnie, what is it?" asked Mabel at last, for Minnie seemed to be at a loss how to begin, now that the time had come. She walked over and sat down on the rug, leaning her head on Mabel's knee, and began, "you know, Mab, dear, that it isn't very long since I found out that there was anything better in life than laughing and dancing and enjoying one's self in the way the world calls enjoyment. I told you all about it before, how Mr. Laurence told me about the happiness of being a Christian, and living for something beside my own pleasure, and how since that I have felt that great happiness myself. I can't talk very much about it, because it is so new--and so--I can't find a word for it, but I think you'll know what I mean--that I don't quite understand it myself, but I feel it all the same, and it has made me another creature. I don't think anybody would believe that who only sees the outside of me, but it is quite true; I have different thoughts and feelings and wishes about everything, and feel altogether as if I had newly awakened and could never go to sleep again."
Minnie had rattled on in her usual impulsive fashion, and now pulled up suddenly, for Mabel's arm tightened round her arm with a convulsive clasp, and her head dropped on her shoulder in a perfect agony of weeping.
Minnie felt a good deal of surprise as well as alarm at this sudden outburst, for she had never seen Mabel so much overcome before, and just now it seemed so altogether unaccountable; she concluded, however, that it would be useless to attempt any solution of the mystery until the storm had somewhat spent itself; she did not, therefore, trouble her with any questions or attempts at consolation, but allowed her to cry on unrestrainedly, only changing her position, that she might the better render her all the support in her power, and convey to her by every means but that of speech her sympathy and concern. At length her sobs began to be less convulsive, and her tears to come less freely, and soon she was able to speak and assure her friend that she need not be under any apprehension concerning her, and that she would soon be able to tell her the cause of her grief.
Minnie waited with great patience for some minutes before she would allow Mabel to speak again, and then, Mabel protesting that it was all over, and that she was quite calm again, began with brimming eyes, notwithstanding her protest. "It must have been the narration of your happiness that caused me to lose control of myself, I felt the contrast between it and my own state of mind so keenly, that I was quite overcome--Oh, Minnie, I would give every drop of mere earthly happiness to feel for one hour, what you have described!"
Minnie looked at her in astonishment. "Why, Mabel, of course you never needed to feel such a thing--you have known about these things all your life!"
"Ah, yes!" replied Mabel, "I have known about them, as you say, but I have never known them. You know one may know all about a thing or person, and yet never know it or him by direct experience."
"That is true," said Minnie, reflectively. "But why did you always try to interest me in them, when you really felt no good effect from them yourself?"
"Please don't ask me that!" entreated Mabel, "It would be worse than useless for me to try to explain it, but it is a fact that I have never known such a change as you talk about--as what we call conversion must surely imply--so I have never been converted, and that is the reason, I suppose, why all my efforts to interest you were always vain. How could I hope to lead you to a Saviour I could not see myself?"
Minnie was silent. She could not understand Mabel's difficulty, and therefore did not feel able to discuss it. She could not say anything to comfort or console her either, from her own short experience, because she felt, notwithstanding all that she had just heard, that Mabel was years and years before her on the road--further by a long way than all the years of her life. She felt this but could not say it; it seemed to hover through her mind like a shadow, and she could not grasp it in order to put it into words.
Mabel saw