SITTING ON A PLANK.
MINNIE and Maud were highly indignant at the treatment Margerie had
received from their grandmother. "I wonder you didn't bring her away
there and then, mother," the former said.
"Would either of you have been willing to take her place?" asked Mrs.
Grace suggestively.
"Grandma doesn't deserve to have any of us," said Maud. "I should just
leave her to muddle on by herself."
"If none of us were allowed more help and comfort than we deserve, we
should sometimes come off badly," her mother observed. "That isn't the
way God treats us, and we are to try and be like Him in all things.
I believe our little Margerie will do grandma real good, the more so
because of the misunderstanding which has just been cleared away."
"I don't see that the poor little thing ought to be made a sacrifice
of, even for grandma's good," objected Maud, who was, however, not
unselfish enough to offer herself as a substitute.
"The worst is over now, I'm sure," said Mrs. Grace. "I saw grandma
looking at her with eyes full of love. Who could help loving Margie?
And I asked the child privately whether I should take her home, and
she said quite earnestly, 'Let me stay a little while longer. I'm
getting to sweep just lovely. And I don't think grandma will be so
cross again.' Bless her heart! You'll see they'll get quite fond of one
another yet."
"Do you 'like' grandma?" asked Minnie abruptly.
"I cannot help feeling very sorry for her," was the reply. "I am sure
she has had many years of unhappiness."
"But it was all her own fault," said Maud.
"Chiefly, perhaps. And she is so much the more to be pitied. No trouble
is so hard to bear as that brought upon us by our own sins or errors,
because there is the additional sting of feeling that it 'need' not so
have been."
"If the way she served Margie is a specimen of her treatment of her
own sons," said Minnie, "I don't wonder at that youngest one running
away. And yet how lonely she must have been all these years! One dead,
and one lost, and the other estranged. It is only natural that father
should be glad to have found her out again, and made it up, for her own
sake."
"He was remarking only yesterday," observed Mrs. Grace, "how plainly
one can see the working of a merciful Providence in this affair. When
we came to Briar Cottage six months ago, we had no idea that grandma
was living in this part of London—she used to reside miles away from
here, but she removed shortly after her last serious disagreement with
your father, and he quite lost sight of her. To think we should have
been led to choose our new abode within so short a distance of her."
"Father seems quite cheered up by this reconciliation, doesn't he?"
said Minnie.
"Yes. I feel sure it has done him a great deal of good. It is what he
has been longing and praying for these many years. And it has given him
such encouragement to hope that the trouble about his health and future
employment may turn out as blessedly in the end."
"But he is getting stronger now, isn't he, mother?"
"Thank God, yes!" said Mrs. Grace fervently. "He is more like himself
than he has been yet since the accident. Our worst fear now is that he
will be lame for life, and only able to move about with the help of a
crutch. And such a disability would be almost certainly fatal to his
obtaining any kind of situation—no one would care to employ a cripple.
Nay, don't look so utterly woeful, children," she concluded, with a
cheery smile. "I am only saying how it appears to human view. God may
see something grandly different. And however it may be, it 'must' be
for the best."
True to the promise made to poor Ned, Mrs. Grace took time the next
morning to look out some of Jamie's old clothes, repair them, and where
needful cut them down to what she roughly guessed would be nearer the
size required by the smaller boy. Busy as she always was, she spent
several hours willingly and even lovingly over this work, for the lad's
neglected appearance had appealed to her tenderest compassion. But the
clothes were never worn.
At breakfast-time that day, Mrs. Grace had said to Margerie: "You can
cut off a slice—a round if you like, for your poor boy. I daresay he
will be looking out for it."
"Oh, thank you, grandma!" cried Margerie, all aglow with pleasure. "How
thick? As thick as that?"
For in consequence of the powerlessness of the old lady's left arm,
Margerie was obliged to cut the bread-and-butter, standing the loaf for
safety's sake on its side, and sawing.
Grandma, however, didn't mention butter, and Margerie was afraid to ask.
Sure enough, there was Ned's towsly black head peeping furtively round
the pillar of the gate. She caught sight of it as she was putting on
her hat and coat for school.
Delighting in the fact that concealment was at an end, and she might do
everything openly, Margerie danced down the path, waving her satchel in
one hand and the inch-and-a-half thick round of bread in the other.
"Ned, Ned!" she cried, quite excitedly. "This is from 'grandma!' She
'gave' it to me on purpose for you. Just think of that!"
"It's all your doing," said Ned, inserting his white teeth in the
slice, as usual, without delay. "Where should I have been last night
without you?"
"And mother," supplemented Margie. "Isn't mother 'sweet?' You are going
to my house to get some nicer clothes to-day, aren't you?"
Ned nodded as he took a fresh bite. He was not a gushing youth by any
means, but his gratitude and appreciation may not have been any the
less for that.
"I'm so glad you told," said Margerie. "Grandma is quite kind and nice
this morning. Aren't you glad yourself, Ned, that you spoke the truth?"
The waif was sitting on the end of a pile of planks, munching with an
air of great satisfaction and swinging one bare foot. Margerie had sat
herself beside him, for she was early that morning. It was not enough
for her great little heart to dispense charity, she must give herself,
in artless friendliness, in frank-spirited sympathy, to sweeten and
enrich the dole.
A stranger passing was attracted first to notice the pair by the
contrast which they presented. Then his gaze wandered from the boy's
grotesquely ragged attire to his face, and rested there with keenest
scrutiny. He walked on however, but after traversing about twenty paces
turned and gazed at them again, earnestly and long.
"I never thought she'd let me off like that," said Ned. "I made sure I
was done for."
"Do you know, Ned," confessed Margerie, after a pause, and twisting the
handles of her bag beneath shy, downcast eyes, "I think I ought to tell
you. I 'did' pray to God so about you yesterday, and asked Him not to
let grandma send you to prison."
"You did?" queried Ned, looking considerably impressed.
"Yes, ever so many times."
"And you think He heard you, and that's why—"
"Of course it was," broke in Margerie, with a conviction of certainty
that admitted of no debate. "He always 'hears' us, you know. And
whenever He can—I don't mean that exactly, because God can do
everything—but—but whenever it won't hurt us, or not be not so good for
us any way, He does just what we ask. Like He did for me, about grandma
and you. Isn't it kind?"
Again Ned nodded, but his deep eyes were full of thought.
"You'll look nice when I see you again, Ned," said Margerie at parting.
"You'll have got your new things on. Perhaps grandma will give me
something for you this evening. Anyhow, you look on the window-ledge
like you always do; 'I' won't forget."
Neither did she; though, grandma not having understood about the supper
arrangement, her provision once more came out of her own private share.
But for the first time the carefully folded parcel lay untouched;
it was still there when Margerie got up in the morning. And to her
real disappointment, no Ned was waiting for her, in the glory of new
apparel, by the wood-yard wall.
She concluded that her mother must have given him so much that he did
not need her offering, or sent him to someone else. But, in truth, the
folks at Briar Cottage were as much perplexed as herself; for although
a neat suit was waiting for him, no Ned had appeared.
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