"
"Then I wish you would ask him to let me off--I mean, to let me
die right out when I do die." What's the good of making a body
miserable?"
"That, I am sure it would be of no use to pray for. He certainly
will not throw away a thing he has made, because that thing may
be foolish enough to prefer the dust-hole to a cabinet."
"Wouldn't you do it now, if I asked you?"
"I would not. I would leave you in God's hands rather than inside
the gate of heaven."
"I don't understand you. And you wouldn't say so if you cared for
me! Only, why should you care for me?"
"I would give my life for you."
"Come, now! I don't believe that."
"Why, I couldn't be a Christian if I wouldn't!"
"You are getting absurd!" he cried. But he did not look exactly
as if he thought it.
"Absurd!" repeated Mary. "Isn't that what makes _him_ our
Saviour? How could I be his disciple, if I wouldn't do as he
did?"
"You are saying a good deal!"
"Can't you see that I have no choice?"
"_I_ wouldn't do that for anybody under the sun!"
"You are not his disciple. You have not been going about with
him."
"And you have?"
"Yes--for many years. Besides, I can not help thinking there is
one for whom you would do it."
"If you mean my wife, you never were more mistaken. I would do
nothing of the sort."
"I did not mean your wife. I mean Jesus Christ."
"Oh, I dare say! Well, perhaps; if I knew him as you do, and if I
were quite sure he wanted it done for him.
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