Minnie did not sleep till she heard him come in softly and go into his room, and even after that she lay for hours thinking of all she had seen that night and rejoicing with the angels over the sinner who had during its early watches returned to her Saviour's arms. Mabel, too, lay long awake that night, but her thoughts were very different from Minnie's. She was pondering over the spectacle of a soul entering into that peace from which she felt herself by some mysterious means shut out. CHAPTER VI. A DISPUTE SETTLED. Next morning Minnie was down at Hollowmell before any one in that region was stirring. She had carried down with her a basket filled with provisions, feeling sure that under the sorrowful circumstances it would be required. She found, as she had expected, that Mrs. Malone was dead. She died at about four o'clock in the morning, her husband informed Minnie, and her last words had been the words he had been reading to her from the fourteenth chapter of John, "Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." He was sitting beside the remains of his wife with the book in his hand, as if he had never moved since the moment of her death, when Minnie entered. He had really loved his wife with all the fervour of his passionate Irish nature, and the remembrance that but for his intemperance, and his cruelty to her, when under the influence of drink, she might have still been alive and happy, had overcome him to such an extent that he had fallen into a half unconscious state, and did not seem to be able to realise anything except that she would speak to him no more. Minnie could not wait then, so she ran into another cottage a little way further on, the door of which was already open, and finding the object of her search (Molly Gray) engaged in the preparation of her own breakfast, she told her of the calamity which had befallen the Malones, and begged her to go in and help them. Molly only waited to refill her kettle that she might find it ready for any emergency, and carrying her own tea with her in a can wherewith to refresh the worn-out watcher, she at once repaired to the bereaved home. Greatly relieved to be able to leave them under efficient care, Minnie hastened home, having first seen the grief-stricken husband swallow some tea, and a few mouthsful of bread, but she had no appetite for her own breakfast, though she made a pretence of eating to escape comment, and rose to prepare for church without having tasted a morsel.