“But there was naught for us to do.  We were too young to be bearers or searchers, and boys cannot tend the sick.  So we grew weary past bearing of the shut-up house, and yestereve our father gave us leave to sally forth and seek news of thee, good aunt.  And oh, we are right glad to find ourselves out of the city and safe with thee!”

Joseph spoke on, because Mary Harmer was weeping so plenteously with joy and gratitude that she had no words in which to answer him.  She had not dared to hope that she should see again any of the dear faces of her kinsfolk.  True, the distemper was yet raging fiercely, and none could say when the end would come; but it was much to know that they had lived in safety through these many weeks.  It seemed to the pious woman as though God had given her a sort of pledge of His special mercy to her and hers, and that He would not now fail them.

She led the boys into her pretty, cheerful cottage, and set them down to the table, where she quickly had a plentiful meal set before them.  Fido’s pathetic story was told, and he was caressed and fed in a fashion that altogether won his heart.  He made them all laugh at his method of showing gratitude; for he walked up to the fire before which a bit of meat was cooking, and plainly intimated his desire to be allowed to turn the spit if they would give him the needful convenience.  This being done by the handy Benjamin, he set to his task with the greatest readiness, and the boys quite forgot all their sorrowful thoughts in the entertainment of watching Fido turn the spit.

Long did they sit at table, eating with the healthy appetite of growing lads, and answering their aunt’s minute questions as to the welfare of every member of the household.  Greatly was she interested in the home for desolate children provided by Lady Scrope, and ordered by her nieces and Gertrude.  She told the boys that her house had often been used to shelter homeless and destitute persons, whom charity forbade her to send away.  Just now she was alone; but even then she was not idle, for all round in the open fields and woods persons of all conditions were living encamped, and some of these had hardly the necessaries of life.  Out of her own modest abundance, Mary Harmer supplied food and clothing to numbers of poor creatures, who might otherwise be in danger of perishing; and she bid the boys be ready to help her in her labour of love, because she had ofttimes more to do than one pair of hands could accomplish, and her little serving girl had run off in alarm the very first time she opened her door to a poor sick lady with an infant in her arms, who had escaped from the city only to die out in the country.  It was not the plague that carried her off, but lung disease of long standing, and the infant did not survive its mother many days.