But ever since the place had been theirs, Dorothy had been in the habit
of going almost daily to the house, with her book and her work, sitting
now in this, now in that empty room, undisturbed by the noises of the
workmen, chiefly outside: the foreman was a member of her father's
church, a devout man, and she knew every one of his people. She had
taken a strange fancy to those empty rooms: perhaps she felt them like
her own heart, waiting for something to come and fill them with life.
Nor was there any thing to prevent her, though the work was over for a
time, from indulging herself in going there still, as often as she
pleased, and she would remain there for hours, sometimes nearly the
whole day. In her present condition of mind and heart, she desired and
needed solitude: she was one of those who when troubled rush from their
fellows, and, urged by the human instinct after the divine, seek refuge
in loneliness--the cave on Horeb, the top of Mount Sinai, the closet
with shut door--any lonely place where, unseen, and dreading no eye, the
heart may call aloud to the God hidden behind the veil of the things
that do appear.

How different, yet how fit to merge in a mutual sympathy, were the
thoughts of the two, as they wandered about the place that evening!
Dorothy was thinking her commonest thought--how happy she could be if
only she knew there was a Will central to the universe, willing all that
came to her--good or seeming-bad--a Will whom she might love and thank
for _all_ things. He would be to her no God whom she could thank only
when He sent her what was pleasant. She must be able to thank Him for
every thing, or she could thank Him for nothing.

Her father was saying to himself he could not have believed the lifting
from his soul of such a gravestone of debt, would have made so little