"I am not so sure of that," retorted Mrs. Batterby. "I think that visions of angels are granted to-day to those that have eyes to see them, just as they were in Old Testament times."
"Oh! Mrs. Batterby," exclaimed Matilda in excitement, "do you really believe that?"
"I do. But I don't believe that the angels appear as you would expect them, Matilda--all got up in harps and crowns and flaming swords. I believe that when they come nowadays they look so commonplace and what you might call ordinary-looking, that only those folks that have the eye of faith can perceive them at all. They can _see_ them all right, mind you! But they can't recognise them as the angels of God."
"How I should like to see somebody who had actually seen an angel!" sighed Miss Skipworth.
"Did you ever come across any one who had enjoyed such an experience, Mrs. Batterby?" asked Mrs. Veale in a sceptical tone.
"Yes, I did, Mrs. Veale--that is, if you can say that you ever came across yourself."
"Oh, how interesting!--how very interesting!" cried Miss Skipworth. "But you don't look at all the sort of person that would see angels and spirits."
Mrs. Batterby took the last remark as a compliment; as indeed it was intended. "That's just my point, Matilda. The real angels don't look like the Scripture-picture sort of angels; and they don't appear to the high-flown, star-gazing sort of people who are always looking for them."
"Do tell us what you saw, Mrs. Batterby," besought the emotional Matilda.
"And also what calamity it foretold," added Mrs. Windybank. "I always believe that supernatural appearances precede some terrible misfortune."
"Well, my experience, or whatever you call it, happened five-and-thirty years ago, and no calamity has happened to me since. On the contrary, it taught me that no calamity _could_ happen to me as long as I lay safe in my Heavenly Father's Hand. That's just the lesson that I learnt from it."
"Do tell us the story," urged Miss Skipworth.
"I will, Matilda, if you'll get on with your bed-jacket, and not leave off your sewing whenever anybody speaks, as if your hearing lay in your fingers, and you couldn't sew and listen at the same time.
"Well, when I was a young woman I lived with an aunt in Merchester who kept a stationer's shop; and every Sunday I used to walk over to see my mother who lived at a village about three miles off, she being a widow and keeping the post-office there and my two little sisters as well.