"Well," he said, "I thought it was all up with you the other day, and now I hear you are none the worse for your spill." "Not a bit worse," said Rowena, "but I have been thinking rather hard. What a bit of luck you came this way! I don't believe Colin would have ever towed me to shore. He's a good swimmer, but his one idea was to get hold of the punt and then come for me. And I don't think I should have lasted out long enough." "I don't believe in luck," said the General gravely. "I had no intention of coming over to see you that afternoon. I was reading in my study and I came across a bit that I liked in one of my old books, and suddenly thought I would like to share it with you. But when I got out into the hall Mysie begged me to take her upon the moors. I very nearly did; but a strong persistent sense of wanting to get to you made me send her away disconsolate, and I came off post haste. I had only just arrived when the squall came on, and we saw your punt capsize from the terrace here. Don't you think I was sent to you?" "By whom? By my guardian angel, I suppose, if I have one. If you had not come and I had gone down, I wonder where I should be to-day?" There was a silence, then Rowena looked straight at him with shining eyes. "Well, honestly, I didn't feel quite ready to leave this world. I thought it out as I floated on the water, and I think I prayed the first fervent prayer in my life. I wanted to be spared. I wanted it desperately. I suppose the love of life is hard to kill, because I am leading a very useless existence at present, and there's no particular reason for me to be spared, when so many others are taken." "Your prayer was answered." "Yes, and I am digging into my Bible furiously; I have read it for an hour at a time. I want to discover the secret that the early Christians had, and which enabled them to go through fire and water unmoved. The Epistles are interesting me. I told you what a heathen I was, didn't I? What a high ideal we are supposed to have of our purpose in this world. It staggers me; I don't like feeling small, but there's no doubt the Bible does that." "Infinitesimally small," said General Macdonald. "But you've read the paradox: 'When I am weak then I am strong.'" "I don't understand half I read." She looked at him with a mixture of shame and amusement. "I wish you would preach me a dear little sermon, General Macdonald. I know you could do it quite as well as our young minister. I never get to church." "No; I could never preach," said General Macdonald seriously; "but I think I can tell you the secret of the early Christians' faith and endurance. They 'endured as seeing Him Who is invisible,' we are told. Our Master's last words were: 'Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.'" "I think," said Rowena very slowly with downcast eyes, "the result of my Bible study is that I want to have Him with me."