"A rascal!" Aunt Sophia says; "and with the four hundred pounds he got
out of me for that Society. But never mind; it was on the strength of
my money that he tried to delude that foolish girl, and so we found out
what a bad fellow he was."
That foolish girl, by the way, has married a farmer, a friend of Brother
William; and Aunt Sophia knits a great many little contrivances of wool
for the results.
The last trouble that happened at the Rosery was when old John Monnick
passed away.
"It's quite nat'ral like, Master James," he said, smiling.
"Seventy-seven, you see. There isn't the least o' anything the matter
with me, and I aren't in a bit o' pain. There's only one thing as
troubles me, and that is 'bout the opening and shutting o' them
glarss-houses. I hope you won't be neglecting of 'em when I'm gone."
"Oh, but you'll be stronger soon, John, with the spring--and come and
look after things again."
The old man smiled, and shook his head slowly from side to
side--"'Tain't in natur', Master James," he said--"'Tain't in natur', my
lady. I come up, and I growed up, and I blossomed, and the seed's dead
ripe now, ready for being garnered, if the heavenly Master thinks it
fit. I'm only a gardener, Master James, and I've been a gardener all my
life; and now, as I lie here, it's to think and hope that he will say:
`Well done, good and faithful servant; enter thou into the joy of thy
Lord.'"
It was Kate Scarlett's lips that formed in an almost inaudible whisper
the word "Amen!" as the old man fell asleep.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE END.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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