"No, Miss Ludolph, I do not know how long we may be kept here; but I fear we shall suffer as much from cold as from heat, and your life might depend upon keeping warm." "I will do whatever you bid me," she said, looking gratefully at him. "That is the way to feel and act toward God," he said, gently. But with sudden impetuosity she answered: "I cannot see what He has just permitted to happen before my eyes. Right has not triumphed, but the foulest wrong." "You do not see the end, Miss Ludolph." "But I must judge from what I see." After she had bathed the poor girl's face, comforted and reassured her, Dennis took up the conversation again and found Christine eager to listen. Pausing every few moments to throw water over his companion, he said: "Faith is beyond reason, beyond knowledge, though not contrary to them. You are judging as we do not judge about the commonest affairs--from a few isolated, mysterious facts, instead of carefully looking the subject all over. You pass by what is plain and well understood to what is obscure, and from that point seek to understand Christianity. Every science has its obscure points and mysteries, but who begins with those to learn the science? Can you ignore the fact that millions of highly intelligent people, with every motive to know the truth, have satisfied themselves as to the reality of our faith? Our Bible system of truth may contain much that is obscure, even as the starry vault has distances that no eye or telescope can penetrate, and as this little earth has mysteries that science cannot solve, but there is enough known and understood to satisfy us perfectly. Let me assure you, Miss Ludolph, that Christianity rests on broad truths, and is sustained by arguments that no candid mind can resist after patiently considering them." She shook her head, silenced perhaps, but not satisfied. CHAPTER XLV "PRAYER IS MIGHTY"--CHRISTINE A CHRISTIAN The day was now declining, and the fire in that part of the city opposite them had so spent itself that they were beginning to have a little respite from immediate danger. The fiery storm of sparks and cinders was falling mostly to the northward. Dennis now ventured to sit down almost for the first time, for he was wearied beyond endurance. The tremendous danger and excitements, and the consciousness of peril to the one most dear to him, had kept him alert long after he ought to have had rest, but overtaxed nature now asserted its rights, and the moment the sharp spur of danger was removed he was overpowered by sleep. Christine spoke to him as he sat near, but even to her (a thing he could not have imagined possible) he returned an incoherent reply. "My poor friend, you do indeed need rest," said she, in kindest accents. He heard her voice like a sweet and distant harmony in a dream, swayed a moment, and would have fallen over in utter unconsciousness on the sands, had she not glided to his side and caught his head upon her lap.