It was not pleasant to give tacit acknowledgment to the fact that poor little, unintellectual Flossy was much more interested than herself.  She gave herself up to an old and favorite employment of hers, that of looking at faces and studying them, when a sudden hush that seemed to be settling over the hither to fidgety audience arrested her attention.

The speaker’s voice was full of pathos, and so quiet had the place become that every word of his could be distinctly heard.  He was evidently in the midst of a story, the first of which she had not heard.  This was the sentence, as her ears took it up: 

“Don’t cry, father, don’t cry!  To-night I shall be with Jesus, and I will tell him that you did all you could to bring me there!”

What a tribute for a child to give to a father’s love!  Flossy, with her cheeks glowing and her eyes shining like stars, quietly wiped away the tears, and in her heart the resolve grew strong to live so that some one, dying, could say of her:  “I will tell Jesus that you did all you could to bring me there!”

Do you think that was what the sentence said to Marion?  Quick as thought her life flashed back to that old dingy, weather-beaten house, to that pale-faced man, with his patched clothing and his gray hairs straggling over on the coarse pillow. Her father, dying—­her one friend, who had been her memory of love and care all these long years, dying—­and these were the last words his lips had said: 

“Don’t cry, little girl—­father’s dear little girl.  I am going to Jesus.  I shall be there in a little while.  I shall tell him that I tried to have you come!”

Oh, blessed father!  How hard he had tried in his feebleness and weakness to teach her the way!  How sure he had seemed to feel that she would follow him!  And how had she wandered!  How far away she was!  Oh, blessed Spirit of God, to seek after her all these years, through all the weak and foolish mazes of doubt, and indifference, and declared unbelief—­still coming with her down to this afternoon at Chautauqua, and there renewing to her her father’s parting word.

She had often and often thought of these words of her father’s.  In a sense, they had been ever present with her.  Just why they should come at this time, bringing such a sense of certainty about them to her very soul that all this was truth, God’s solemn, real, unchangeable truth, and force this conviction upon her in such a way that she was moved to say, “Whereas I was blind, now I see,” I can not tell.

Why Mr. Hazard was used as the instrument of such a revelation of God to her I can not tell.  Perhaps he had prayed that his work at Chautauqua that rainy afternoon might, in some way, be blessed to the help of some struggling soul.  Perhaps this was the answer to his prayer—­unheard, unseen by him, as many an answer to our pleading is, and yet the answer as surely comes.  Who can tell how this may be.  I do not know.  I know this, that Marion’s heart gave a great sobbing cry, as it said: