CHAPTER IV.
SUNDAY.
THE Sunday morning rose fair and beautiful, and every one was stirring in good time, for milk must be cared for and animals fed on Sunday as well as on other days. Marion was a little late—not a very uncommon occurrence; and when she came down, it was to find Aunt Christian doing her special work of setting the table, placing the porridge-basins and her father's pitcher of kirn milk (buttermilk) by his place as if she had always done it.
"That is my work, Aunt Christian," said Marion, trying to speak pleasantly, though she felt a little vexed, she hardly knew why.
"Is it? It always used to be mine. I believe setting the table is always the work of the youngest member of the family. It seemed very natural to fall into it again."
"Aunt Christian means to show us that she doesn't feel above us," thought Marion as she began to put things in order in the sitting-room; but she was mistaken.
It never occurred to Aunt Christian to think that any should suppose her capable of "feeling above" any one, least of all her own family.
"Did you preach while you were in Scotland, Duncan?" asked old Hector as after prayers they sat down to breakfast.
"Oh yes, several times—once at St. Andrew's, where I had a famous churchful of professors and students and the principal himself, two or three times in other places, and once at I—, where the duke himself did me the honour to come and hear me."
Marion cast a glance of triumph at Aunt Baby.
"That was very civil of His Grace," said Hector.
"Did he speak to you?" asked Marion.
"Yes; he made me a very pretty compliment and asked me to call upon him."
"And did you?"
"Of course. I was bound to pay my duty to my chief and my father's landlord; and besides, His Grace was pleased to desire some information concerning his affairs in these parts which I was able to give him. He was very gracious, asked specially after you, father—and presented me his snuff-mull to give you, a fine silver one with a Cairngorm pebble for a lid."
"That was very pretty of him," said the old man, evidently much gratified. "I shall use it with much pleasure."
"How does he look, Uncle Duncan?" asked Marion.
"He is said very strongly to resemble your humble servant, my dear. I think I am quite his equal in good looks, though I say it that shouldn't."
"Were you frightened at preaching before him?" asked Marion, pursuing her catechism.
"Not a bit. I was rather blate at holding forth before the principal of St. Andrew's, but I soon forgot it. There is one great pleasure in preaching to a Scotch congregation—you are sure that not a word will be lost by inattention."
"But, Uncle Duncan, I thought you were a medical doctor, and not a D. D.?" said Marion.
"Both, Marie; I preach on Sundays and practice on week-days."
"Then you do more than a good many people," said Uncle Alick.
"Mr. Parmalee will be after you to preach for him next Sunday."
"And I shall do so very willingly, but to-day I shall be very thankful neither to preach nor practice in that sense. Do we walk or ride to church?"
"We walk always in pleasant weather. It is only a mile. Come, children, you must not sit talking any longer, or we shall not be ready."
The walk to church was a very pleasant one down the valley. A good part of the way was by the bank of the clear little river which ran through Holford, and was pleasantly shaded by birch and pine trees, while two or three points gave beautiful views of the mountains which "stood round about" the pretty village.
"'Look how the hills on every side Jerusalem enclose,'"
quoted Doctor Campbell. "I am always reminded of that verse when I come down this road, though these green, shady hills are not much like the arid mountains round Jerusalem."
"And you have seen Lebanon and Carmel since you were here last?" remarked Alick.
"Yes, and the mountains of Moab and Olympus and Ararat, and many a famous height besides."
"There is where I envy you," said Alick—"I mean your travels all over the world. I believe I want to see Lebanon as much as ever Moses did. If I had my wish, I would travel seven years."
"Why, Uncle Alick, I never supposed you cared for any such thing," said Marion, with not a very polite emphasis. "I never supposed you thought of anything but crops and cattle, you seem always so contented with our humdrum way of living."
"You don't quite know Uncle Alick all through, Marie, for as long as you have lived with him," answered Alick, good-humouredly.
"But if you like to travel so much, why don't you?"
"When you are as old as I am, you will know that the next best thing to having what you like is liking what you have. Pray, what do you suppose would have become of the farm and the stock if I should indulge my fancy for wandering all over the world? So I do my travelling with newspapers and books and stereoscopic views."
"Of which last I have brought you a bushel, more or less," said Duncan. "One thing I can tell you, Marie: if you don't like what you have, you will find you will never have what you like."
"I don't understand you, Uncle Duncan."
"Consider the saying as a wise oracle, to be worked out at your leisure," said Doctor Campbell. "How does your church missionary society prosper, Alick?"
Alick answered, and the two men walked on, engaged in earnest conversation, while Marion, instead of considering her uncle's oracle, began wondering whether she had not said something foolish—something which would lower her in Uncle Duncan's estimation.
As they drew near the village they overtook Therese.
"I thought you were going to stay at home over Sunday?" said Marion.
"So did I," answered Therese, "but mother thought there would be a storm this afternoon; and besides, I don't like to miss the Sunday school. You have company, haven't you?"
"Yes; my uncle and aunt from Syria."
"What, the missionaries? How nice! Oh, Marion, do you think he will talk to the Sunday school? Miss Oliver said perhaps he would when he came. And have you asked him about our girl—little Rachel, you know?" said Therese, with sparkling eyes and true French volubility.
"How you do ask questions, Therese! Uncle and aunt came only last night, and I have not had time to ask them everything," said Marion, who in truth had never thought of little Rachel. "I dare say my uncle will give a lecture or do something of that kind; missionaries always do."
"How does your class collection come on? Ours is almost made up," said Therese.
"I supposed Kitty Tremaine's class would have finished first because she gives so much herself," said Marion; "our teacher, Mrs. Buckley, gives only ten cents a Sunday."
"Kitty gives only five, I know."
"Why, Therese Beaubien! As rich as they are, to give only five cents a Sunday! Well, I would be ashamed."
"I don't think they are so very rich, Marion," said Therese; "Kitty has only a dollar a month of pocket-money, besides the six dollars a year she gets from her uncle in New York, which she keeps for Christmas. I think if she gives away so much of her income, she does pretty well, don't you?"
"I didn't think of that," said Marion; "but her mother might give her more!"
"Yes, but then it would not be her contribution, you see, and now it is."
"It is miserable to be obliged to calculate so closely, anyhow," said Marion, impatiently. "I do hate to think about every cent I spend. Uncle Duncan visited a gentleman in Scotland who has a million dollars a year."
"Oh, Marion!"
"Yes, he has, and more than that."
"It must be very nice," said Therese. "But, Marion, I don't call you poor. What would you do if you had to work for seventy-five cents a week, as I do?"
"I wouldn't live at all," said Marion.
"Yes, but you would have to, whether you liked it or not," said Therese, shrewdly. "People are not asked whether they will live or not. They are set down in their lot and left to make the best of it."
"Eh, little lass, how is that? Left?" said old Hector, who was nearer than the girls thought, and whose hearing was as sharp as ever, notwithstanding his great age.
Therese turned round, blushing and smiling. She had a great reverence for the old man and always felt pleased and flattered when he talked with her, as he often did. In fact, there was a very warm friendship between the old Highlander and the little French girl, despite the difference in their ages.
"Why, yes, I suppose so," said she, doubtfully, in answer to his question.
"I would think a bit more anent that matter," said Hector. "That would be a dreary faith to sit down with, my dawtie—not much better than that of the old heathen philosophers, poor souls! But here we are at the kirk door even now. Take the thought with you, and see what you will make of it before we meet again. It is a matter worth thinking of, I can assure you, lassie."
So, you see, Marion and Therese had each her own problem to consider. But the two treated the matter very differently. Marion wondered what Uncle Duncan meant, then tossed the whole subject aside into a dark closet of her mind, and fell to thinking what a fine thing it would be to have such an income as the duke of Argyle. Some time, perhaps, she may clear out—or, as Hector would say, "redd up,"—this same dark closet, and find various matters hidden therein.
Therese, to continue the figure, laid her problem on a shelf in plain sight, that she might often turn her eyes toward it as she went about her daily toil.
There was quite an excitement when Mr. Parmalee proclaimed at the close of Sunday school that Doctor Campbell would give a missionary lecture in the church on Wednesday evening, and that Mrs. Campbell would meet the girls of the missionary band at the parsonage on Saturday afternoon at two o'clock.
"Won't it be nice?" said Therese, with sparkling eyes.
"Very," answered Marion, but she did not seem particularly interested in the matter.
"Marion has had the advantage of us," said Kitty Tremaine; "she has had the first news. Did your aunt bring us a photograph of little Rachel, Marion? She said she would if she could."
"I don't know," said Marion, in the same dreamy way. And then, waking up a little, "I couldn't ask her everything all in a minute, you know. There were plenty of things to talk about, without beginning on missions the first thing. Just think how long it is since aunt has seen any of her friends! I do hope I have some consideration," said Marion with her grand air.
"I dare say you never thought of it," said Lizzy Gates.
"Well, and if she didn't, it is no wonder," returned Kitty, seeing from Marion's manner that Lizzy had, as usual, hit the mark with her conjecture.
"Not a bit of harm," answered Lizzy, laughing. "Oh, Marion, where did you get your watch? Did your aunt bring it to you?"
"Yes; Mr. Van Alstine sent it to me from New York," answered Marion, displaying her treasure.
"How pretty!" "And your name on it, and all!" "What a nice man your father-in-law must be!" said one and another.
"I should be looking to see what time it was a dozen times in an hour if it was mine," said Lizzy. "Let us see yours, Kitty."
Kitty produced the one she wore, an old-fashioned open-faced watch with ornaments of coloured gold and some very curious engraving on the back.
"But that isn't your grand one," said Lizzy.
"I mean the little green one with all the diamonds in the back."
"Oh, I don't wear that; mamma says it is altogether too fine for a school-girl, and I must keep it till I am grown up. So I leave it safely in its box, and use this, which Aunt gave me. And to tell the truth, I like this a great deal better. But yours is lovely, Marion—just the very thing."
"Such is life," said Lizzy, assuming a tragic air; "one person riots in watches, and the next has only an eight-day clock—perhaps only a brass one which needs winding every night. Here comes Julia Parmalee. Julia, have you heard any more of the mission meeting? Are we to bring our work, or what?"
"You can bring what if you like, but I would choose the work," said Julia. "Anyhow, mother hopes you will all come prepared to stay to tea, and we want to send to all the girls who are not here. Marion, can you get word to the Bryants?"
"Yes, but they won't come. Mr. Bryant doesn't believe in giving money to foreign missions."
"What does he believe in giving money to? Does anybody know?" asked Lizzy.
"Hush, young woman! Restrain your intellect, and don't be satirical. Anyhow, Marion, we will give them the chance, and perhaps they will come for once."
"Especially if they know it is a tea-fight," said Lizzy the irrepressible.
"Lizzy, I shall ask my father to take you in hand and give you a lecture if you don't behave better. Come, now, be good. Will you undertake to tell Eliza Bridgeman? You can't say she doesn't care for missions, and she isn't here to-day."
"No, indeed! She cares for everything that is good, poor little dear! I will not only tell her of the meeting, but I will coax Miss Perkins to let her come. Now, is there anybody else?"
"Nobody that I can think of. Father will give out the notice in church this afternoon, and we shall talk it all over in school. Here comes Matty McRae; I must ask her specially. Matty, you will be sure to come to the meeting at our house Saturday, won't you, and please tell all the district school girls?"
"I shall not do any such thing, Miss Julia Parmalee, so there!" answered Matty, with a movement of her whole person which I don't know how to describe otherwise than as a flounce. "You may get some one else to do your errands for you; and as for me, I am too proud to go where I am not wanted."
The girls looked at each other, and Julia answered, gently,—
"But we do want you, Matilda. Why should you think we don't?"
"Because I know you all feel above me; you Crocker school girls think yourselves above all the rest of the world. I think I am as good as you are any day, if I don't wear a gold watch. And I must say, as for the missionaries, I think, when they are able to give away gold watches to their nieces, they are able to support themselves."
"Oh!" said Lizzy, in a tone which implied "Now I understand."
"But, Matilda, neither my aunt nor uncle gave me the watch," said Marion. "It was sent me by my father-in-law, Mr. Van Alstine."
"Oh yes, so you say now! And you couldn't keep quiet about it, but must look at it once in ten minutes all Sunday school time. I do hate such ostentation."
"Matty, did you ever have a loose tooth?" asked Therese.
"Yes, I suppose so; what of it?" answered Matilda, forgetting her anger for the moment in the oddity of the question.
"And didn't you keep touching it with your tongue or feeling it every few minutes?"
"Yes, I suppose so; every one does."
"Well, was that because you were proud of it?"
All the girls laughed, and Lizzy exclaimed, "Well done, Therese! That is what Miss Oliver would call an apt and pertinent illustration."
"You had better mind your own business, Therese Beaubien," said Matilda. "I don't think Tone Beaubien's daughter has any business crowding herself in with decent people, anyhow. Well, there! You needn't all look at me as if I had committed murder," she added, with an uneasy laugh, as she felt the glances of contempt which fell upon her from all sides. "I shouldn't have said anything if she hadn't begun it. I do think so, and a great many other people besides me."
"Then you and your 'great many other people' had better keep your thoughts to yourselves," said Lizzy Gates, angrily. "You—Well, there, Julia! I won't begin, so you needn't look at me so. Never mind, Therese dear; nobody cares for what such people say."
"I think this missionary business is all nonsense, any way, and so does pa," continued Matilda, feeling, to do her justice, rather ashamed of her meanness and willing to divert attention from herself. "Pa says he should come to church more only for this everlasting begging. He says, too, that it is all nonsense to take the Sunday school collection from the children and then give it to foreign missions. It ought to go to support the school, and I think so too. I think we might just as well use our forty dollars to buy new Sunday school books with."
"But where would be the charity in that, Matilda?" asked Marion. "It would be just taking money out of one pocket to put it into the other."
"Or we could have a nice Christmas festival," continued Matilda. "Pa says he gave a dollar and a half last year, and the presents we had off the tree didn't come to more than a dollar."
"Because all the nicest and prettiest things went to the poor children," said Julia Parmalee, who never lost patience in explaining matters.
"Well, anyhow, I am not going to give money to help buy gold watches for anybody's niece," said Matilda, and with that she departed.
"Now she will tell that story to her aunt, Miss Perkins, and it will go all over the town," said Lizzy; "and I dare say she won't let Eliza come to the meeting, after all."
"But then I told her just how it was," said Marion.
"Yes, much she will care for that, or Miss Perkins, either. Never mind, Marion; it wasn't your fault."
"I wish I hadn't worn my watch at all," said Marion; "I am sure I didn't mean to make any display of it. But that's just the way it always is," added Marion, with a sigh. "There is never anything nice in the world but somebody comes to spoil it."
"'I never nursed a dear gazelle
To glad me with its soft black eye
But when it came to know me well,
And love me—'
"Somebody was sure to say 'My uncle gave it to me,'" quoted Lizzie, slightly altering the verse to suit the occasion. "Dear me, Marion! If you are going to let your pleasure in your watch be spoiled so easily, you don't deserve to have it."
"And as for the story, it is only one more," added Julia. "I wouldn't mind about it. I don't believe Matilda will influence any one who would have given anything. Kitty, how does your class get on?"
"Oh, pretty well," answered Kitty. "The bother of my class is that as soon as the children really begin to learn anything I have to send them away. I sent out three of my nicest children this morning—two little Lenoirs and your cousin Madelaine, Therese. Why, where is Therese? I thought she was here."
"She has gone home, I fancy," said Julia. "Poor child! I am so sorry for her."
"I do think it is the meanest thing that ever was in the world to twit that child with her father," said Lizzy Gates, with her usual emphasis. "Just as though she was to blame!"
"It is a shame," said Kitty. "Miss Perkins asked mother if we were not afraid to trust Therese about the house. She said she should always be expecting her to get up in the night and let her father in at the back door. But I think Therese will live it down. She has a great deal of force and of real principle too."
"Miss Perkins needn't say anything. One reason why Lenore Beaubien has got away so much of her custom is that people who took lace and velvet to Miss Perkins thought they didn't get it all back again."
"Hush, Lizzy! You shouldn't say so."
"Well, perhaps not, after your father's sermon on evil speaking this morning. I can't help being vexed for Therese, and she never says a word for herself. But there goes the bell for afternoon church. You are not vexed at me, are you, Marion?"
"No, of course not," said Marion; "only vexed at having made such a fuss."
"It was not you that made the fuss. I wouldn't mind about it, anyhow. Don't let it spoil your Sunday, as mother says to me when anything disagreeable happens."
"I don't see why Kitty Tremaine should have a class in Sunday school any more than the rest of us," said Marion to Julia when the rest had gone and they were left alone together for a few minutes. "She is only six months older than I am."
"Well, you know it begun three years ago, because Kitty was the only one in the school besides her mother and Miss Oliver who could speak French," * said Julia. "Kitty would like very well to give up her class, and come into school, but your uncle won't hear of it because she manages the infants so nicely."
* See "Kitty's Christmas Tree," American Sunday School Union.
"Oh yes, Uncle Alick thinks she is the eighth wonder of the world. I don't see anything so remarkable about her. Just think how intimate she used to be with that horrid Fanny Duskin, and what scrapes she used to get into."
"But that was a long time ago, Marion. Kitty has not been in a scrape in school for more than two years. I don't mean, of course, that she never does wrong, but I do think she tries to be a consistent Christian."
"Your geese are all swans, Julia."
"Well, that is better than thinking all my swans geese. But, Marion, if you really want to try teaching, why don't you ask Mr. McGregor to let you have Emily Sibley's class? You know she won't be here after this Sunday, and you couldn't wish for a nicer class than that."
"I mean to ask him about it this very day," said Marion.
"I wonder what old Mr. McGregor meant by what he said to me this morning?" thought Therese, as she brushed away a few tears, "I'm sure my lot is a hard one enough, and I don't see any best to be made of it. I ought not to say I am left, either, I suppose, when I have so many good friends. I wonder if that was what he meant?"
CHAPTER V.
LONG TALKS.
AS Marion walked home from Sunday school, she resolved to ask Aunt Christian about Rachel "and all the rest of it," as she said, rather contemptuously.
"I might have had the first news to tell the girls if I had had any wit. How stupid they must have thought me not to know a single thing about it! And my watch, too! It was so silly in me to look at it so many times, as if I had never seen one before. I saw Mrs. Bartlett smile, I know. I don't believe Kitty thinks any more of hers than if it were a handkerchief. I suppose her aunt in Paris sent her the diamond-set watch. I would give a great deal to know whether Kitty really is proud of her grand rich relations; though as to that, her connections are not so grand as ours. Just think! The duke himself is a kind of cousin of ours."
And then Marion fell into a kind of reverie or waking dream, in which she represented herself as going abroad, making the acquaintance of dukes and other titled people, marrying some great personage—she did not quite decide whether he should be a prince or some English nobleman—and finally meeting Kitty Tremaine and patronizing her graciously.
Marion passed a great deal of her time in dreams of this kind, in which she always enacted the heroine, performing incredible and often impossible feats of self-sacrifice, courage, and benevolence, running the most frightful risks and going through the most desperate adventures, but always coming out at last in a blaze of honour, riches, and high station.
She enacted every heroine of every story she read, but her favourite character was entirely one of her own creation, namely, "the heiress of the McGregors." This young lady was a damsel of the most varying fortunes. When all went well with Marion in school or at home, the heiress of the McGregors had very nice times. But when things went wrong—when Miss Oliver found fault with her for not having her lessons, for blotting her exercise-book, or inking her fingers, when Aunt Baby insisted on her sweeping her room and mending her stockings, or declined to take her advice about the arrangement of household matters—then the fortunes of the heiress were overcast, then did her wicked uncle strive to make her marry the objectionable cousin who wanted her property, then did he shut her up in the gloomy chamber with barred windows and set the wicked old woman to spy upon her motions and insult her in all possible ways. The heiress of the McGregors it was who had occasioned Marion's being kept after school, and in general it must be said that this much persecuted young lady was responsible for most of her forgetfulness of present duty.
But Marion had taken a book from the library that day which was destined to open a new life to the heiress of the McGregors. She opened it at first without any great expectation of interest or amusement, but soon became so absorbed in its pages as to take no heed of anything else. She read through it the first time at express speed, and then, turning back, she read it more leisurely—a very good plan, be it observed, when a book is worth reading at all. She was so absorbed in the volume that she forgot her intention of learning all about Rachel and the school from her aunt; and though Doctor and Mrs. Campbell were talking about the mission all the evening, she never heard nor heeded till her grandfather said:
"What do you think of that, Marion? That would be worse than the soap-making that you complain of."
"Think of what? Oh, it would be very nice," said Marion, looking up absently. "I should like it very much;" and then, pettishly, as every one laughed, "I don't know what you are talking about."
"So it seems," said Aunt Christian. "I think you would hardly say you liked the work your uncle has been describing."
"Marion was reading her Sunday school book," said Aunt Baby, always ready to excuse and shield her darling. "What is it about, Marie?"
"I don't think you would be interested in it, Aunt Baby," said Marion, rather superciliously; "but you can read it if you like."
"Let me see," said Uncle Alick, stretching out his hand for the book, which Marion rather unwillingly parted with.
"Who buys your books?" asked Doctor Campbell.
"Mrs. Tremaine and Miss Oliver, usually," answered Alick. "We had a large quantity given us this spring, however, by a lady who spent last summer here, and I see this is one of them. It was very kind in her, but I must confess I have my doubts about some of the books. I think I will ask Mrs. Tremaine to look them over."
"Yes, and then she will be sure to take out all the interesting books, just as she did 'Madeline Trevor' last summer," said Marion.
"'Madeline Trevor'!" repeated Mrs. Campbell, in amazement. "You don't mean to say that you had that in the Sunday school library?"
"Even so," answered Alick; "it was given us, as this was, by one of the summer visitors who have invaded us of late years, and went through several hands before Mrs. Tremaine stopped it."
"And I never could see why she needed to stop it at all," said Marion; "it was so interesting, and had a great deal of religion in it."
"And a good deal else, unluckily. However, I cannot say I have found any harm in these books, though a great many of them are rather feeble."
"This isn't feeble, at any rate," said Marion, thinking, at the same time, "How absurd of uncle to think himself capable of judging of books!"
"Aunt Christian, why haven't you ever written a Sunday school book?" asked Marion, presently. "I think you might make such an interesting story about the schools out there."
"Because there are only twenty-four hours in the day, my dear; and when each of these hours is already filled as full as it will hold, there is no room for more, even as when a pint cup already holds a pint of milk you can by no means put a pint of molasses therein."
"I have often wished that somebody would do that same thing, however," remarked Doctor Campbell. "I think, if such a book were successful, it might do a great deal toward rousing an interest in the mission work."
"Yes; Marion's hint is a good one, and I will certainly take it into consideration," said Mrs. Campbell. "You see, Marion, the only person who could write such a book is one of the teachers who have been engaged in the work of the school and lived among the people; but I will certainly think the matter over."
The next day Mrs. Campbell was engaged in unpacking and disposing of her possessions and distributing the presents she had brought home. Marion was delighted with a string of large and finely-cut amber beads and a bottle of genuine otto of rose, nor was the heiress of the McGregors above being gratified with a box of Rabat-Lookoom. For the benefit of such unfortunate people as have no friends in Turkey, I will explain that Rabat-Lookoom is a delectable kind of marmalade or paste, made, I believe, of the juice of figs and other fruits. It is known to city confectioners as Turkish fig-paste.
"Are you going to school to-day?" asked Mrs. Campbell.
"Yes, I suppose so," answered Marion, in a somewhat discontented tone. "If one stays out, one is behind all the others just so far. Then, when it comes to review day, there is just so much more to do, for Miss Oliver never will let us miss a lesson."
"Miss Oliver is a very thorough teacher," remarked Aunt Baby. "There, Marion! Your dinner-basket is all ready, and I wish at noon-time you would go round to Barton's and ask him to send up a barrel of flour, six pounds of white sugar, and a box each of cloves, pepper, and cinnamon. Can you remember all that?"
"Yes, I suppose so," answered Marion. "Good-bye, Aunt Christian."
"If I finish my unpacking in time, I will walk down to meet you," said Mrs. Campbell. "I have a string of olive-wood beads for Grandfather Beaubien which I must carry myself. I suppose the old man is living still?"
"Yes, but very old and feeble," answered Miss Barbara. "Tone's disgrace nearly killed him."
"Has he become a Protestant?"
"Not avowedly, but he comes to church sometimes in fine weather and reads the French Bible which Mrs. Tremaine gave him. I think the old man is a very good Christian according to his lights. He has brought up his children well. Poor Tone is the only black sheep in the flock, and old Michael has been wonderfully kind and patient with his daughter-in-law, poor perverse woman that she is."
Marion had reached the school-room door before she again remembered that she had forgotten to ask anything about Rachel.
"There! now the girls will all be at me again," she said to herself. "One good thing is that I have errands enough to do to keep me busy all through noon-time; and besides, I can tell them that Aunt Christian would rather tell the story herself."
It did occur to Marion that this was not quite an honest account of the affair, but Marion was becoming rather careless in the matter of exact truthfulness. This is very apt to be the case with people who are constantly obliged to make excuses for themselves, and Marion's conduct had needed a great many excuses of late.
The girls received her account of the matter very readily, however, the more that a new subject of interest had arisen which in some degree eclipsed the little Syrian maiden whom the girls of Holford Sunday school had been keeping at the boarding-school in Beiruyt for the last two years.
"Just think, Marion! Tone Beaubien has been seen again. Cousin Sam was up on Blue Hill looking for a stray colt, and met a man who he knows was Tone, though he had a great beard on. Sam says he recognized him in a minute. He used to know Tone very well when they were boys."
"Did he speak to him?"
"No. He was going to, but Tone—if it was Tone—dodged aside among the bushes, and Sam did not see him again. I dare say he didn't look very closely."
"And no shame to him if he didn't," said Kitty Tremaine. "I hope Sam was mistaken, for poor Therese's sake. It will be a terrible thing for her if her father turns up again."
"I should think your mother would be afraid to have her in the house," said Laura Bryant, who had told the story. "Mother says she shall never have Mrs. Beaubien to wash again."
"I think that is hardly fair," said Kitty. "Mrs. Beaubien is not to blame if her husband has come back; and, after all, it may be a mistake. One man with a beard looks very much like another. I know when we lived in Paris I used to think all Frenchmen looked exactly alike."
"How fond Kitty is of bringing in 'when we were in Paris'!" whispered Laura to Marion, who nodded without paying much attention to what was said.
"But really, Kitty," continued Laura, "do you believe your folks will keep Therese if her father is about? I should think your mother would be awful scared."
"Mother is not easily scared," answered Kitty, quietly. "We are all very fond of Therese, and we shall need her more than ever, because Cousin Tilly is going to the Cure for a while on account of her sprained ankle."
"Do you and Therese really talk French together, and all that?" questioned Laura, who had considerably more curiosity about her neighbours' affairs than about her lessons, and who was especially interested in all the doings of the Tremaine household.
"I don't know what 'all that' means," answered Kitty, smiling; "we certainly do both speak and read French together. Mother says it is good practice for me, and that as French is Therese's native tongue, so to speak, it is a pity that she should lose it. It may be very useful to her some time, and to us too."
"Well, I wouldn't do it," said Laura. "If I had a servant, she should keep her place."
"Therese never gets out of hers," said Kitty. "She is the best mannered girl I almost ever saw. But I am very sorry to hear this rumour about her father on more accounts than one. Here comes Miss Oliver. Laura, if you don't want to be reminded of your place, I advise you to get down off the top of the desk."
At recess Miss Oliver called Marion to her side:
"What about your arithmetic lesson, Marion? Have you written it out, as I told you?"
Marion displayed her book.
"That is right, and very neatly done," said Miss Oliver. "Marion, my dear, why won't you always give me the pleasure of praising you?"
Marion looked down and played with her watch-chain.
"There is not a girl in the school with better abilities than yourself," continued Miss Oliver, "nor one who can, if she chooses, make herself more agreeable, and yet there is hardly one of your age who does not stand better than yourself. Why is it?"
Marion murmured that she didn't know how it was.
"I think I know," said Miss Oliver: "it is because you do not take pains. Your mind is not on your work. I often see you sitting with a book before you and looking out of the window for half an hour together. I do not pretend to know what you are thinking of at such times, but certainly your thoughts are not where they ought to be—on your present duties.
"You are losing two very precious things, my child, time and opportunity—two things which, once lost, can be found no more in this world, no more, perhaps, in the whole universe. You are abusing the kindness of your grandfather, who keeps you at school, you are a constant worry and annoyance to me, you set a bad example to the others, you help to lower the character of the school, and you are ruining your own. Now, what am I to do with you?"
Miss Oliver paused a moment, and then went on more gravely still:
"I can tell you what I shall do, Marion: there are two months more remaining of this term. I shall give you those two months in which to turn over a new leaf. If I do not see a very marked improvement at the end of that time, I shall lay the matter before the trustees and ask them to remove you from the school. It will grieve me to the heart to take this course on your own account, and still more on that of your friends, but I shall certainly do it."
Never in all her life had Marion been so utterly mortified and humiliated. She was crushed not only by the weight of the blow, but by its entire unexpectedness. She had somehow gone on flattering herself that she was a favourite with Miss Oliver and a person of great consequence in the school, and the thought that she could be expelled never entered her mind. But she knew that Miss Oliver was a woman of her word, and that her representation was all powerful with the trustees of the little endowed school. Oh, if she should be expelled, what a dreadful disgrace it would be!
Marion would have liked to escape to her usual refuge of considering herself persecuted, but it would not do. Conscience was aroused, and forced her to look the matter steadily in the face. She dared not accuse Miss Oliver of injustice; she knew it was all true. For the last year and more she had been steadily falling behindhand in her lessons; she had evaded her duties all she possibly could; and even when she had learned a lesson, it made no permanent impression, but had passed through her mind like water through a sieve, because she bestowed no after-thought upon it. If there was a puzzle in the arithmetic or algebra lesson or a hard line in Virgil, Kitty Tremaine, Lizzie Gates, and Julia Parmalee, and some others, would very likely get together after school and find a real pleasure in disentangling the hard knot.
But not so Marion. "I could not do it," or "I did not understand it, Miss Oliver," satisfied her. In her character of "the heiress of the McGregors" Marion was endowed with every accomplishment, from playing the harp down to embroidering tapestry, while the real Marion seemed likely to be left without even the decent beginnings of an education.
"Well, I can't help it," said Marion, pettishly, to herself, at last; "Miss Oliver might make the lessons more interesting." And then came the reflection, "The lessons are interesting to the others; why not to you? Lizzy Gates is quite as bright; Kitty Tremaine has seen ten times more of the world. Her mother is a very accomplished woman, and able to take Kitty to New York, or even to Paris, for her education, and yet she keeps her with Miss Oliver." Marion was obliged to abandon that line of defence, and she could not at once find any other to which she might betake herself.
"Well, I will turn over a new leaf—I really will," said Marion. "It would be perfectly dreadful to be turned out of school. If I could only go somewhere else, I know I should do better. I have been to Miss Oliver so long. But I don't see how that is ever to come about. Grandfather says he can't afford to let me have French lessons this term, and I don't believe Miss Oliver would allow it, either. She would be sure to bring up all my bad Latin lessons and those horrible irregular verbs and prepositions governing the accusative. Oh dear! How unhappy I am! And there are all Aunt Baby's errands that I must do this noon instead of reading my book. However, that is just as well, for I should not dare to let Miss Oliver see me reading a story-book. Oh what a plague it is! I never can have half a chance."
Marion was so far impressed with Miss Oliver's words that she did every one of her errands and got through her afternoon's lessons without a single failure. She was walking homeward, reading as she went, when she came upon Mrs. Campbell.
"Why, Aunt Christian, is this you? How did you come here?" asked Marion.
"Really, Marie, I am half affronted," answered Mrs. Campbell, smiling; "didn't I tell you I was coming down to meet you as you came home?"
"Yes, to be sure; it was very nice in you," said Marion, trying to appear glad, when in truth she would rather have been alone. Marion thought it was one out of many signs of her superiority that she "loved solitude." "Have you been anywhere in the village?"
"Yes; I called on Michael Beaubien and saw several of my old acquaintances in the French settlement. I see a great change there, Marion."
"Yes, every one says so."
"But the old man did not seem so cheerful as he used to be," continued Mrs. Campbell. "I fancy he has something on his mind."
"Very likely," answered Marion. "I dare say Sam Bryant has told him the story of his seeing Tone up on Blue Hill, Saturday. I hope it is not true, but Laura says Sam is quite sure. I shall be afraid to stir away from home if he is round, shall not you? He is such a desperate character."
"Really, Marie, I have lived so much among desperate characters of late years that I think I have become rather hardened to them. If you imagine Tone Beaubien multiplied by five hundred, you will have some faint notion of our neighbours at our last country station. But I hope with you that Sam may be mistaken, for it would be a great misfortune to the whole family if Tone should come back. That is one trouble of one member of a family taking to evil courses. The disgrace of one is reflected on all the rest."
Marion felt as if her aunt had given her a slap without meaning it. She hastily changed the subject:
"Have you ever read this book, aunt? I think it is perfectly splendid."
Mrs. Campbell took the book and looked at it:
"Yes, we had it on the ship, and I read it while on board."
"And didn't you like it very much? Don't you think Maria is well drawn?" Then, without waiting for an answer, "I think it was grand for her to take her career into her own hands and insist on doing something worth while, instead of wasting her time and talents in that humdrum old place with stupid people. If I could only see something like that opening before me, I should have some courage to live," said Marion, pathetically "as it is, I haven't one bit."
Mrs. Campbell had not been teaching since she was sixteen without becoming acquainted with the genus girl in almost all its varieties. "Oh, you sentimental little gosling!" was her inward thought, but she showed no signs even of amusement.
"But, Marion, if I recollect rightly, these humdrum people had taken Maria when she was an orphan child, and had stinted themselves to give her support and education. Don't you think she owed them some duty? Was it a very exalted course of action to go away from them the moment she was able, leaving her benefactors, in their old age and loneliness, unaided and uncomforted? Was it right to treat them in that way?"
"One's first duty is one's own development and improvement," said Marion, grandiloquently, yet with a certain uneasy consciousness that the words and Miss Oliver's late lecture did not go well together.
"Do you think so? I don't. I read that no man liveth or dieth to himself, and that whosoever will come after the divine Pattern of all must deny himself and take up his cross daily. I think, moreover, that the best way of improving ourselves is simply to do our duty as it is presented to us."
"I don't believe much in duty, anyhow," said Marion, shifting her ground. "I think the ruling principle should be love, and not duty."
"Love of what?" asked Mrs. Campbell.
Marion was not prepared with an answer.
"I don't like this opposing of love and duty which I find is so much the fashion," continued Mrs. Campbell. "They are no more opposed than a man's flesh and bones are opposed, if you will forgive a doctor's wife for using such an anatomical figure. The skeleton alone would never make a man, but the man would be worth little without it. He would be like the Boneless in grandfather's story—a poor crawling creature, quite unable to stand upright, and having, moreover, if I remember rightly, a very uncomfortable habit of strangling people. As to your heroine, Marie, I must say, at the risk of lowering myself in your opinion, that I do not at all admire her."
"But she accomplished so much, Aunt Christian. Just think how she helped those people who were afflicted with the insanity of their daughter, and trained the children when their mother had spoiled them and all the rest. Was not that better than spending her life in making shirts and butter and reading the newspaper to her uncle?"
"No, Marie, I don't think it was, not if the shirts and the butter, and so on, were the work which Providence had given her."
"Well, I can't agree with you," said Marion; "and I don't think you are very consistent with yourself, Aunt Christian. Why didn't you stay at home?"
"Because, my dear, I had my living to earn. Times were hard in those days. The farm produced little, and there was no market for that little. Mother was very delicate, and the hive would not hold honey for us all. I would gladly have stayed at home; but as I said, I had my living to earn. I always expected to come home when Aunt Baby married, but after her great disappointment there was an end of that, and then Eiley came home to be cared for."
"Why, Aunt Christian, you don't mean to say that Aunt Baby ever had a love-affair?" exclaimed Marion. "I should as soon expect to hear such a story of old Ball."
Marion looked up as she spoke, and encountered a glance from Christian's fine gray eyes which made her feel at once that she had spoken improperly.
"I don't like to hear you speak in that way of my sister, Marion," said Christian, very gravely. "Setting aside your own personal debt of gratitude for her care and kindness ever since you were a baby, there is not a woman in the world more worthy of respect than Barbara McGregor. Yes, Barbara had a love-affair which came to a sorrowful termination. She was troth-plight to a very fine young man named Fergus Kerr, who was mate of an East Indiaman. He engaged for one more voyage before he should be married, with the promise of being promoted to the command of a fine new vessel on his return. The vessel sailed with every prospect of a favourable voyage, and was never heard of again.
"You have a lively imagination, Marion. I leave you to represent to yourself all the agony of suspense and despair before Barbara settled down into her present state of cheerful content and daily self-sacrifice—a self-sacrifice which has grown so complete that she has ceased to be aware of it herself. I have known many good women, but I never knew one better than Barbara."
Mrs. Campbell spoke with an earnestness which brought tears into her eyes. The two walked on in silence a little way, and then Marion broke out again:
"After all, Aunt Christian, all this does not reconcile me to my present way of life, this round of petty details which takes up all my time and is so belittling and cramping. I am sure I am willing to help, and I do. I do half the errands for the family, and more too. I help about the butter and feed the hens and churn. I am willing to sacrifice myself to any extent, but—"
"What do these errands consist in?" asked Aunt Christian.
"Oh, in many little things—in buying sugar and tea, and all such things as we buy at the store, in getting grandfather snuff and going to the post-office, and so on. I am willing to do them, too, but I do feel it a great sacrifice to occupy my mind and time with such trifles."
"But, Marion, don't you eat and drink your share of the sugar and tea and spices and flour? And do not the dairy and the hens help to buy your new frocks and hats, and so on?"
"Yes, I suppose so, of course."
"Well, then, excuse me, my dear, but really is there any such great self-sacrifice in buying your own dinner or your own hats and gloves? Are you not working for yourself all the time?"
Marion was silent. She had not thought of matters in that light.
"As for these details of which you complain," continued Mrs. Campbell, "they belong to every kind of work as much as to housework, and are often of a much more disagreeable character. I assure you I have found it so. You don't like sweeping. How would you like to superintend a school of twenty girls not one of whom had ever known the use of a nail-brush or a fine comb, to say naught of other troubles? How would you like to associate all day with such people?"
"Anyhow, I should feel that I was bringing something to pass."
"You are bringing, in the end, just the same thing to pass in one case as in the other, and that is your duty," said Mrs. Campbell, "the thing which your heavenly Father gives you to do, and which you please and honour him in doing. That is the secret, my lassie—to learn to do everything to and for him; and believe me, my child, he is by far the easiest master we can have. It not seldom happens that we do our best in this world, and, after all, we are misunderstood, and to the eyes of men we may seem to fail utterly, but our heavenly Father never misunderstands us, and no work which is done for him ever fails. Here we are at last. How slowly we have walked!"
Marion was not sorry. She had lately become very impatient of any religious conversation, especially when it appealed to herself.
"Aunt Christian doesn't understand me any better than the rest," she said to herself, when she went up to her room. "Nobody ever does. If my father had lived, he would have felt for me. I suppose I am like him, and that sets them all against me. Oh dear! I wish I could only have a chance I would show them what was in me."
Nevertheless, the events of the day made so much impression that Marion learned all her lessons for next morning before "the heiress of the McGregors" was allowed to enter upon a career of active usefulness among her tenantry, for which she was bitterly persecuted by her wicked uncle.
CHAPTER VI.
"WHERE CAN SHE BE?"
FOR two or three weeks Marion's lessons went on better. Bending all her powers of mind, which were by no means contemptible, to the construing and understanding of her lessons in Virgil, she made the remarkable and delightful discovery that she was reading poetry. Now, I am well aware that there are many teachers who either never make this discovery for themselves, or if they do by any chance find it out, they use every effort to conceal the fact from their unlucky pupils, and try to make those pupils consider the "sweet singers of old days" as only so much material for parsing.
But Miss Oliver was not such a teacher. She had a strong sense of beauty in all things; she had a correct and highly cultivated taste, and she gave her pupils the benefit thereof; she wished to make them readers as well as students. She gave them subjects for composition which involved study and consultation of books, and the school library books showed more signs of wear under her administration than they had ever done before. In short, Miss Oliver tried in every way to create and encourage a love of knowledge and literature for their own sake, and she succeeded. Under her management the Crocker school had become as good and useful as any institution in the whole State, and its scholarships began to be eagerly looked after.
On the Thursday evening before the missionary meeting, as Marion was walking slowly homeward, she was joined by Lizzy Gates. Lizzy had been one of Miss Oliver's early trials. Under the rule of old Miss Parsons, who was a kind of Queen Log, Lizzy had been allowed to do according to her own pleasure; and as she had little or no training at home, that pleasure was not of a very good kind. She was both violent tempered and deceitful—two qualities more commonly united than many people suppose. But Lizzy was gifted with strong natural sense. She began with more or less open rebellion, but she soon found she had met her match in Miss Oliver. She was first conquered, then she began to admire and at last ended by loving her conqueror with all her heart. Not only had she turned out a capital scholar, but she had become heart and soul a Christian; and barring some hastiness of speech, she walked very consistently.
"I am going up to your house, Marion," said Lizzy; "mother wants Miss Barbara's recipe for short-bread and some turkey eggs, so I told her I would walk up with you and get them."
"Can't you stay to tea?" asked Marion. "Do, and then you will see Aunt Christian and Uncle Duncan."
"Well, mother said she had no doubt I would if any one asked me, and perhaps I had better not disappoint her," answered Lizzy, laughing. "Here is Therese coming; let's wait for her."
"I wonder if she is going home? I should hardly think Mrs. Tremaine would allow it, now that her father is supposed to be about," said Marion.
"I don't believe Therese has heard the story, and probably Mrs. Tremaine doesn't wish that she should. Well, Therese where are you bound?"
"Home," answered Therese.
"You won't have much time."
"No, and I don't mean to stay a minute. Mrs. Tremaine told me to come back as soon as I could, because she wanted me. I left my French Testament at home, and I am going after it."
"You are very happy with Mrs. Tremaine, are you not?"
"Yes, indeed," answered Therese, earnestly. "No girl could have a better home, and then it is such a chance for me. Grandfather says I shall be very much to blame if I don't improve it."
"What do you mean by 'a chance'?" asked Marion. "What sort of 'a chance'?"
"Such a chance to learn," answered Therese. "Mrs. Tremaine gives me time to learn my lessons every day, and hears me say them herself. There are not many girls who have a better teacher than she is—not even Miss Oliver's girls, for as high as they hold their heads," concluded Therese, laughing. "You know Matty McRae says that Miss Oliver's girls are stuck-up to the skies."
"But what do you study?"
"Grammar one day and arithmetic the next. Then I read aloud both French and English, and write exercises when I have time. So, you see, I am getting on famously, and I am quite right in saying that very few girls have such a chance."
For a moment Marion remembered her own words about never having "a chance" with something like a pang of conscience.
"You must have to work very hard, do you not?" said she.
"Oh no, not so very; but I shall not have so much to do now Miss Crocker is going away. Oh dear! I do hope she will get well."
"Father says she has been very foolish—" Lizzy began; but Marion interrupted her:
"Oh yes, of course; Dr. Gates would think any one very foolish who went to the Cure."
Lizzy coloured and her eyes flashed at this certainly not very civil remark.
After a minute's silence, however, she answered quietly, though not without a certain emphasis,—
"If you had taken time to hear me out, Marion, perhaps you would have understood the matter better. What I meant to say was that father said Miss Crocker was very foolish to try to keep round on her lame foot when it was first hurt. He says if she had been content to keep it up on the sofa for a week, it would never have troubled her, and he is glad she is going to the Cure, because Doctor Henry will make her keep still."
"Miss Tilly knows that herself now," said Therese. "But she didn't think it was anything."
"Just so, but she ought to have believed what father told her. She might have had some confidence in him."
"She knows that too," said Therese. "She said yesterday to Kitty and me, 'Take warning by me, girls, and don't think yourselves so much wiser than every one else.'"
"But honestly, now, Therese, wouldn't you like better to go to school as we do?" asked Marion, after a minute or two of mortified silence.
"Of course I should," answered Therese. "Who wouldn't? I don't pretend to enjoy washing dishes or ironing or running up and down stairs so much as I do studying and reading story-books, but what then? I have not my choice in the matter. Somebody must work, and work is no hardship so long as one is strong and well and does not have too much of it. I do not work nearly as hard as Aunt Lenore or Aunt Madelaine."
"Lenore likes her work, too; I heard her say so," answered Lizzy.
"Yes, I know she does; she has a natural taste that way, and is very skilful in using her fingers. All our family are so," said Therese, with a little gentle pride. "Still, work is work, whether you like it or not, and it isn't pleasant to work when one would rather play or read."
"Yes; if one need only work when one felt like it, I shouldn't mind it so much," said Marion, with a sigh.
"If you only worked when you felt like it, you would never accomplish anything in the world," said Lizzy. "I am sure that plan doesn't answer with lessons at all. I soon found that out. I tried it with my music. I thought it would be dreadful to play when I didn't feel like it, and presently I discovered that I never did feel like doing the most important parts of my lessons, the scales and exercises. Now I just say to myself, 'If I don't have this lesson, Mr. Dundas will scold nineteen to the dozen when he comes, and that will provoke me and worry mother dreadfully.' So I go at it as I would at the clothes-wringer. It is the same with my compositions. If I wait till I feel like it, I am sure to be behindhand."
Now, Marion had been behindhand several times lately, and she chose to consider these words of Lizzy's as a hint at herself. It was a great mistake, for Lizzy was not a person to give hints of any sort. However, she drew into her shell and was very silent for the rest of the walk, while Lizzy and Therese chatted gayly of all sorts of things.
"Well, good-bye, girls. I suppose I shall see you on Saturday?" said Therese as they parted. "Are you going home pretty soon, Lizzy?"
"No; Marion has asked me to stay to tea," said Lizzy, who had never guessed the offence she had given. "Be sure you come on Saturday, Therese."
"How Mrs. Tremaine does spoil Therese!" said Marion, pettishly, as Therese went on her way. "She is growing as forward as can be. I don't think it is any kindness to her at all."
"Why, Marion, I think she is as sweet as can be," answered Lizzy, warmly; "and as to her being forward, who was there to be forward to? I'm sure she is as good as we are; why not?"
"But her father, Lizzy," said Marion, feeling that it would hardly answer to bring the heiress of McGregor under the eye of such an irreverent person as the doctor's daughter.
"Well, she isn't to blame for that, and I think it would be a shame to visit it on her, don't you, Miss Barbara?"
"Don't I what, lassie?" asked Miss Baby, who was very fond of Lizzy, though she did not hesitate to check her occasional forwardness. "Don't you see my brother and sister, Doctor and Mrs. Campbell? Come and speak to them now, like a lady. Christian will be glad to know your mother's daughter."
"Well, I beg your pardon, Miss Baby," said Lizzy, blushing as usual, but accepting the check with perfect good-humour. "You know I always must go headlong, as ma says; I did not see that any one was here."
"And I am sure you are Lizzy Webb's daughter," said Mrs. Campbell, coming forward; "you look exactly as she did when we used to go to school together."
"Yes, ma'am, I am Lizzy Webb Gates. Ma sent her love to you, and she is coming to see you as soon as baby is old enough to let her go out."
"And now what was it you desired my opinion upon? asked Miss Baby, when the presentations had been duly accomplished.
"Oh, nothing of any great consequence," answered Lizzy, feeling pretty sure that Marion would not care to have her remark repeated to her aunt. "I was saying that it would be wrong to blame or slight Therese Beaubien for the faults of her father."
"Very wrong and unfeeling. I hope nobody does it?"
"Well, I think some people do. Matty McRae downright insulted her last Sunday. She said Tone Beaubien's—Well, there! I won't repeat it, because I might not get the words just right, but she did throw it in her face, and I think it's very mean."
"It certainly was, but I should not expect a great deal of poor Matty. She has never had much 'chance,' as Marion says. But, my dear, you will stay to tea, won't you? You will have plenty of time to go home afterward."
Lizzy gladly accepted the invitation. She took off her bonnet and put her hair to rights, and was soon seated in the parlour, quite at her ease. Presently her tatting came out of her pocket, and the shuttle began to fly through her fingers in that deft way which is so easy to those who know it, and so incomprehensible to those who do not.
"I see that tatting is very much in fashion again," remarked Mrs. Campbell; "I think I must try to learn it. What do you say, Miss Lizzy? Will you teach me?"
"I will try," answered Lizzy; "but I can tell you beforehand it is one of the hardest things to teach or to learn in the world."
"Well, I will make a bargain with you. If you will make me learn tatting, I will teach you to make needle lace—an art which an Armenian lady made a great favour of imparting to me."
Lizzy consented, and the lesson went on amid much laughter from teacher and pupil. Marion looked on languidly. How could her aunt be so interested in such a trifle? How could Lizzy be so entirely at her ease with two strangers like Doctor and Mrs. Campbell?
"There is one thing, Lizzy, at which I am surprised," remarked Mrs. Campbell, presently—"one thing in which I may say I am a good deal disappointed. I have seen quite a number of the Crocker school girls, and not one of them has asked me a question about little Rachel or the school. I thought you took a great interest in the child. She does in you, I assure you."
"I am sure we do in her, Mrs. Campbell," answered Lizzy, very much surprised and a little offended. "We are all longing for Saturday to come that we may hear about her. But Marion said that you wanted nothing should be said about the matter till then, so of course I asked no questions."
Mrs. Campbell turned to Marion with a look of surprise.
"I did not say that, Lizzy," said Marion, feeling very much confused, for she had forgotten the whole matter. "What I did say was that I thought Aunt Christian would rather tell you the story herself. I thought it would spoil all the interest of the lecture if it was talked over beforehand. That was all."
"You certainly said—However, it doesn't matter; I dare say that was what you meant," said Lizzy. She saw that Marion was placed in an uncomfortable predicament, and had no desire to make it any worse for her. Lizzy was learning that charity which "rejoiceth not in iniquity."
"I don't see how you could think so, Marion," said Mrs. Campbell, rather indignantly.
"You certainly gave me that idea, Aunt Christian. However, I suppose I am wrong, as usual," said Marion, resignedly but mournfully. "It is always my fate to do the wrong thing."
"That is an unlucky fate, certainly," said Mrs. Campbell, dryly. "But now, Lizzy, what can I tell you about Rachel that you will like to hear?"
"Oh, everything," said Lizzy. "Tell me what sort of clothes she wears, please. Are they like ours?"
Mrs. Campbell replied, and the whole party were soon deeply engaged in asking and answering questions.
Marion alone sat silent and constrained, hardly hearing a word that was said, though Doctor Campbell, pitying her embarrassment, made several attempts to include her in the conversation. Marion's thoughts were busy with herself; as usual:
"How could I be so silly? What will Aunt Christian think of me? I might have known it would come out. Oh dear! How unfortunate I always am! Here is Lizzy Gates talking away at her ease and making aunt think she is so sensible and bright, and I sit here looking like a fool. Oh dear! Was there ever any one so unlucky as I am? Everything is sure to go against me. I did so want Aunt Christian to like and appreciate me, and now she never will."
"There! Now you have it right, if you can only remember it," said Lizzy, at last. "I must say I hate to have people in general ask me to show them, but you have learned very quickly. I don't know how long it took me, and I believe poor Marion finally gave the matter up for a bad business, didn't you, Marion?"
"Yes," answered Marion. "I have no taste for fancy-work—at least not for that kind. I can't give my mind to such little matters—I really cannot," said Marion, with an air as if she were apologizing for her own superiority. "I cannot keep my attention fixed upon them; the first I know, my thoughts are at the ends of the earth."
"That is rather unfortunate," said Doctor Campbell. "Is it only in such little things that you find that difficulty?"
"I don't find it in things that interest me," answered Marion; "but I must confess I do hate drudgery."
"And what do you call drudgery, my dear?"
Marion did not know exactly how to answer the question, but after a little consideration she said,—
"I call any work drudgery where you have to go on doing the same things over and over without any variety or interest."
"Then all work which is not interesting is drudgery?"
"Yes, to me it is. Some people seem to like it well enough. I call it drudgery to wash dishes and bake and sew and learn lessons that one does not care for."
"And, in short, to do any work which is not immediately entertaining or amusing," said Doctor Campbell, finishing the list as Marion paused.
"Then I am sure you would never learn music in the world, Marion," said Lizzy, "because more than half of that is real drudgery. You ought to see the pages of five-finger exercises Mr. Dundas gives me. But now, Dr. Campbell, what work do you call drudgery?"
"I don't call any work drudgery," said the doctor. "It is a bit of cant to which I have a special objection. So long as there is no one task which any one is called on to perform that may not be hallowed by a good intention, and done for the sake of One who has done all for us, there is no task which should be disgraced by the name of drudgery. What you say about your music applies to all the work in the world. More than half—yes, more than two thirds—of it is utterly uninteresting in itself. It must be made first a matter of duty and obedience, and then you may make it a labour of love in the way I hinted at."
"I should not think it would be so in your work, Doctor Campbell," said Lizzy.
"In ours quite as much as in any other, Lizzy. Seen from the outside, the life of a foreign missionary has an aspect of romance about it. Seen from within, it has as little of romance as any other calling whatever. To say nothing of the trials of sickness and danger and homesickness—the last not the least—a foreign missionary comes in contact with more sordid, disgusting details than any other worker, unless it may be a work-house doctor or a clergyman in a low city district. There come up constantly things which are unspeakably disgusting both in a moral and physical point of view, but which nobody knows but the missionary, simply because they are too bad to be told. Then come the misunderstandings with fellow-workers and with friends at home; and, in short, the missionary's life is like any other: in order to do hard work, you must work hard," concluded the doctor, smiling.
"Do missionaries ever quarrel?" asked Lizzy.
"Missionaries, my dear, are human beings. I do not think they quarrel more than other people—perhaps not quite so much. But you can see that in such a small, isolated community, depending on each other for society, and thrown very much together, the greatest prudence and caution are necessary. You know how, when a large family connexion live near each other, one single person who is imprudent or malicious in speech may set the whole by the ears."