The History of Gutta-Percha Willie | Page 6

"Yes; you wouldn't love us any more than if you were dead asleep
without dreaming."
"That would be dreadful."
"Yes it would. So you see how good God is to us-to go on working,
that we may be able to love each other."
"Then if God works like that all day long, it must be a fine thing to
work," said Willie.
"You are right. It is a fine thing to work-the finest thing in the world, if
it comes of love, as God's work does."
This conversation made Willie quite determined to learn to knit; for if
God worked, he would work too. And although the work he undertook
was a very small work, it was like all God's great works, for every loop
he made had a little love looped up in it, like an invisible, softest,
downiest lining to the stockings. And after those, he went on knitting a
pair for his father; and indeed, although he learned to work with a
needle as well, and to darn the stockings he had made, and even tried

his hand at the spinning-of which, however, he could not make much
for a long time-he had not left off knitting when we come to begin the
story in the next chapter.
CHAPTER III.
HE IS TURNED INTO SOMETHING HE NEVER WAS BEFORE.
HITHERTO I have been mixing up summer and winter and everything
all together, but now I am going to try to keep everything in its own
place.
Willie was now nine years old. His mother had been poorly for some
time-confined to her room, as she not unfrequently was in the long cold
winters. It was winter now; and one morning, when all the air was dark
with falling snow, he was standing by the parlour window, looking out
on it, and wondering whether the angels made it up in the sky; for he
thought it might be their sawdust, which, when they had too much, they
shook down to get melted and put out of the way; when Tibby came
into the room very softly, and looking, he thought, very strange.
"Willie, your mamma wants you," she said; and Willie hastened
up-stairs to his mother's room. Dark as was the air outside, he was
surprised to find how dark the room was. And what surprised him more
was a curious noise which he heard the moment he entered it, like the
noise of a hedgehog, or some other little creature of the fields or woods.
But he crept gently up to his mother's bed, saying-
"Are you better this morning, mamma?"
And she answered in a feeble sweet voice-
"Yes, Willie, very much better. And, Willie, God has sent you a little
sister."
"Ooooh!" cried Willie. "A little sister! Did He make her Himself?"
"Yes; He made her Himself; and sent her to you last night."

"How busy He must have been lately!" said Willie. "Where is she? I
should like to see her. Is she my very own sister?"
"Yes, your very own sister, Willie-to love and take care of always."
"Where is she?"
"Go and ask nurse to let you see her."
Then Willie saw that there was a strange woman in the room, with
something lying on her lap. He went up to her, and she folded back the
corner of a blanket, and revealed a face no bigger than that of the big
doll at the clergyman's house, but alive, quite alive-such a pretty little
face! He stood staring at it for a while.
"May I kiss her, nurse?"
"Yes-gently-quite gently."
He kissed her, half afraid, he did not know of what. Her cheek was
softer and smoother than anything he had ever touched before. He sped
back to his mother, too full of delight to speak. But she was not yet
well enough to talk to him, and his father coming in, led him
downstairs again, where he began once more to watch the snow,
wondering now if it had anything to do with baby's arrival.
In the afternoon, it was found that the lock of his mother's room not
only would not catch easily, but made a noise that disturbed her. So his
father got a screwdriver and removed it, making as little noise as he
could. Next he contrived a way, with a piece of string, for keeping the
door shut, and as that would not hold it close enough, hung a shawl
over it to keep the draught out-all which proceeding Willie watched. As
soon as he had finished, and the nurse had closed the door behind them,
Mr Macmichael set out to take the lock to the smithy, and allowed
Willie to go with him. By the time they reached it, the snow was an
inch deep on their shoulders,