It was just a year since Ernestine had gone, and such a long, sad, hopeless year! Not a clue or trace of any kind could they find except that she had gone to New York. The Canfield ticket agent had had his suspicions when a lady had bought a ticket and gone on the midnight train; but it was none of his business, to be sure; so she had gone on her way unmolested, and farther than that, they knew nothing. Where she went on reaching the city, no one knew, though no mode of search had been left untried, and no expense spared, either by Mrs. Dering, or the relatives and friends who so heartily sympathized in her heart-broken search. There was nothing, from himself to the last dollar he possessed, that Mr. Congreve did not offer; and Jean sent a tear-stained note with a crisp ten dollars--all she had, and saying: "Mama, please spend it to find Ernestine; and I ask God every few minutes, if He won't please let us have her again." But it had all been in vain. In the long days when Ernestine had sat and thought and grieved, she must have matured her plans well, or else she had gone blindly forth, on the wild impulse of despair, and been swallowed in the black wickedness of the great city, into which she went. It was a ceaseless question in the anxious hearts of those who loved her, but there never came any answer; and the days and weeks dragged into months until the year had rolled around, and they had heard nothing. The name of the lost became more precious than ever, and many things she had left behind, that all spoke so eloquently of her, they treasured as priceless, and wet them with many a sad tear, while heart and lips pleaded for the return of the dear one. The year of anxiety had told on Mrs. Dering, for the soft brown hair was thickly lined with grey, and there was a never-dying look of prayerful anxiety in her face, as though in some way, her life-work had been remiss and the fault of this one, gone astray, lay at her door. Still she never once gave up hope that at some time God would return this dear one to her, though it required constant prayer to strengthen the faith that trembled on the threshold of this affliction. Under the strain of mental and physical work, her health was slowly giving way, and for many weeks there had been the anxious question, "what can be done to relieve mama?" and there had been no way discovered, for money was low, and each one already doing her utmost; so Mrs. Dering held her position at the seminary, and was obliged to content herself with one visit home a week, and sometimes not even that, for the hack drive was so fatiguing, and besides, it cost fifty cents every time. Well, after all, God never fails to give us something to cheer our flagging steps, never fails to know when a burdened child is falling with its load, and never fails to take the hand outstretched to Him, and help that child along!