THE BROWN CLOAK IN NOVEMBER.
November days drew toward an end; December was near. One afternoon Mrs.
Mathieson, wanting Nettie, went to the foot of the garret stairs to call
her, and stopped, hearing Nettie's voice singing. It was a clear,
bird-like voice, and Mrs. Mathieson listened; at first she could not
distinguish the words, but then came a refrain which was plain enough.
"Glory, glory, glory, glory,
Glory be to God on high,
Glory, glory, glory, glory,
Sing his praises through the sky;
Glory, glory, glory, glory,
Glory to the Father give,
Glory, glory, glory, glory,
Sing his praises all that live."
Mrs. Mathieson's heart gave way. She sat down on the lowest step and
cried, for very soreness of heart. But work must be done; and when the
song had ceased, for it went on some time, Mrs. Mathieson wiped her
tears with her apron and called, "Nettie!"
"Yes, mother. Coming."
"Fetch down your school-cloak, child."
She went back to her room, and presently Nettie came in with the cloak,
looking placid as usual, but very pale.
"Are you singing up there to keep yourself warm, child?"
"Well, mother, I don't know but it does," Nettie answered, smiling. "My
garret did seem to me full of glory just now; and it often does,
mother."
"The Lord save us!" exclaimed Mrs. Mathieson, bursting into tears again.
"I believe you're in a way to be going above, before my face!"
"Now, mother, what sort of a way is that of talking?" said Nettie,
looking troubled. "You know I can't die till Jesus bids me; and I don't
think he is going to take me now. What did you want me to do?"
"Nothing. You aint fit. I must go and do it myself."
"Yes I am fit. I like to do it," said Nettie. "What is it, mother?"
"Somebody's got to go to Mr. Jackson's--but you aint fit, child; you eat
next to none at noon. You can't live on porridge."
"I like it, mother; but I wasn't hungry. What's wanting from Jackson's?"
Nettie put on her cloak, and took her basket and went out. It was after
sundown already, and a keen wind swept through the village street, and
swept through Nettie's brown cloak too, tight as she wrapped it about
her. But though she was cold and blue, and the wind seemed to go through
_her_ as well as the cloak, Nettie was thinking of something else. She
knew that her mother had eaten a very scanty, poor sort of dinner, as
well as herself, and that _she_ often looked pale and wan; and Nettie
was almost ready to wish she had not given the last penny of her
shilling, on Sunday, to the missionary-box. When her father had given
her the coin, she had meant then to keep it to buy something now and
then for her mother; but it was not immediately needed, and one by one
the pennies had gone to buy tracts, or as a mite to the fund for sending
Bibles or missionaries to those who did not know how to sing Nettie's
song of "glory."
She wondered to herself now if she had done quite right; she could not
help thinking that if she had one penny she could buy a smoked herring,
which, with a bit of bread and tea, would make a comfortable supper for
her mother, which she could relish. Had she done right? But one more
thought of the children and grown people who have not the Bible,--who
know nothing of the golden city with its gates of pearl, and are nowise
fit to enter by those pure entrances where "nothing that defileth" can
go in,--and Nettie wished no more for a penny back that she had given to
bring them there. She hugged herself in her cloak, and as she went quick
along the darkening ways, the light from that city seemed to shine in
her heart and make warmth through the cold. She was almost sorry to go
to Mr. Jackson's shop; it had grown rather a disagreeable place to her
lately. It was half full of people, as usual at that hour.
"What do you want?" said Mr. Jackson, rather curtly, when Nettie's turn
came and she had told her errand. "What!" he exclaimed, "seven pounds of
meal and a pound of butter, and two pounds of sugar! Well, you tell your
father that I should like to have my bill settled; it's all drawn up,
you see, and I don't like to open a new account till it's all square."
He turned away immediately to another customer, and Nettie felt she had
got her answer. She stood a moment, very disappointed, and a little
mortified, and somewhat downhearted. What should they do for supper? and
what a storm there would be when her father heard about all this and
found nothing but bread and tea on the table. Slowly Nettie turned away,
and slowly made the few steps from the door to the corner. She felt very
blue indeed; coming out of the warm store the chill wind made her
shiver. Just at the corner somebody stopped her.
"Nettie!" said the voice of the little French baker, "what ails you? you
look not well."
Nettie gave her a grateful smile, and said she was well.
"You look not like it," said Mme. Auguste; "you look as if the wind
might carry you off before you get home. Come to my house--I want to see
you in the light."
"I haven't time; I must go home to mother, Mrs. August."
"Yes, I know! You will go home all the faster for coming this way first.
You have not been to see me in these three or four weeks."
She carried Nettie along with her; it was but a step, and Nettie did not
feel capable of resisting anything. The little Frenchwoman put her into
the shop before her, made her sit down, and lighted a candle. The shop
was nice and warm and full of the savoury smell of fresh baking.
"We have made our own bread lately," said Nettie, in answer to the
charge of not coming there.
"Do you make it good?" said Mme. Auguste.
"It isn't like yours, Mrs. August," said Nettie, smiling.
"If you will come and live with me next summer, I will teach you how to
do some things; and you shall not look so blue neither. Have you had
your supper?"
"No, and I am just going home to get supper. I must go, Mrs. August."
"You come in here," said the Frenchwoman; "you are my prisoner. I am all
alone, and I want somebody for company. You take off your cloak, Nettie,
and I shall give you something to keep the wind out. You do what I bid
you!"
Nettie felt too cold and weak to make any ado about complying, unless
duty had forbade; and she thought there was time enough yet. She let her
cloak drop, and took off her hood. The little back room to which Mme.
Auguste had brought her was only a trifle bigger than the bit of a shop;
but it was as cozy as it was little. A tiny stove warmed it, and kept
warm, too, a tiny iron pot and tea-kettle which were steaming away. The
bed was at one end, draped nicely with red curtains; there was a little
looking-glass, and some prints in frames round the walls; there was
Madame's little table covered with a purple cloth, and with her work and
a small clock and various pretty things on it. Mme. Auguste had gone to
a cupboard in the wall, and taken out a couple of plates and little
bowls, which she set on a little round stand; and then lifting the cover
of the pot on the stove, she ladled out a bowlful of what was in it, and
gave it to Nettie with one of her own nice crisp rolls.
"Eat that!" she said. "I shan't let you go home till you have swallowed
that to keep the cold out. It makes me all freeze to look at you."
So she filled her own bowl, and made good play with her spoon, while
between spoonfuls she looked at Nettie; and the good little woman smiled
in her heart to see how easy it was for Nettie to obey her. The savoury,
simple, comforting broth she had set before her was the best thing to
the child's delicate stomach that she had tasted for many a day.
"Is it good?" said the Frenchwoman when Nettie's bowl was half empty.
"It's so good!" said Nettie. "I didn't know I was so hungry."
"Now you will not feel the cold so," said the Frenchwoman, "and you will
go back quicker. Do you like my _riz-au-gras_?"
"_What_ is it, ma'am?" said Nettie.
The Frenchwoman laughed, and made Nettie say it over till she could
pronounce the words. "Now you like it," she said; "that is a French
dish. Do you think Mrs. Mat'ieson would like it?"
"I am sure she would!" said Nettie. "But I don't know how to make it."
"You shall come here and I will teach it to you. And now you shall carry
a little home to your mother and ask her if she will do the honour to a
French dish to approve it. It do not cost anything. I cannot sell much
bread the winters; I live on what cost me nothing."
While saying this, Mme. Auguste had filled a little pail with the
_riz-au-gras_, and put a couple of her rolls along with it. "It must
have the French bread," she said; and she gave it to Nettie, who looked
quite cheered up, and very grateful.
"You are a good little girl!" she said. "How keep you always your face
looking so happy? There is always one little streak of sunshine
here"--drawing her finger across above Nettie's eyebrows--"and another
here,"--and her finger passed over the line of Nettie's lips.
"That's because I _am_ happy, Mrs. August."
"_Always?_"
"Yes, always."
"What makes you so happy always? you was just the same in the cold
winter out there, as when you was eating my _riz-au-gras_. Now me, I am
cross in the cold, and not happy."
But the Frenchwoman saw a deeper light come into Nettie's eyes as she
answered, "It is because I love the Lord Jesus, Mrs. August, and he
makes me happy."
"_You?_" said Madame. "My child!--What do you say, Nettie? I think not I
have heard you right."
"Yes, Mrs. August, I am happy because I love the Lord Jesus. I know he
loves me, and he will take me to be with him."
"Not just yet," said the Frenchwoman, "I hope! Well, I wish I was so
happy as you, Nettie. Good-bye!"
Nettie ran home, more comforted by her good supper, and more thankful to
the goodness of God in giving it, and happy in the feeling of his
goodness than can be told. And very, very glad she was of that little
tin pail in her hand she knew her mother needed. Mrs. Mathieson had time
to eat the rice broth before her husband came in.
"She said she would show me how to make it," said Nettie, "and it don't
cost anything."
"Why, it's just rice and--_what_ is it? I don't see," said Mrs.
Mathieson. "It isn't rice and milk."
Nettie laughed at her mother. "Mrs. August didn't tell. She called it
reeso---- I forget what she called it!"
"It's the best thing I ever saw," said Mrs. Mathieson. "There--put the
pail away. Your father's coming."
He was in a terrible humour, as they expected; and Nettie and her mother
had a sad evening of it. And the same sort of thing lasted for several
days. Mrs. Mathieson hoped that perhaps Mr. Lumber would take into his
head to seek lodgings somewhere else; or at least that Mathieson would
have been shamed into paying Jackson's bill; but neither thing happened.
Mr. Lumber found his quarters too comfortable; and Mr. Mathieson spent
too much of his earnings on drink to find the amount necessary to clear
off the scores at the grocer's shop.
From that time, as they could run up no new account, the family were
obliged to live on what they could immediately pay for. That was seldom
a sufficient supply; and so, in dread of the storms that came whenever
their wants touched Mr. Mathieson's own comfort, Nettie and her mother
denied themselves constantly what they very much needed. The old can
sometimes bear this better than the young. Nettie grew more delicate,
more thin, and more feeble, every day. It troubled her mother sadly. Mr.
Mathieson could not be made to see it. Indeed he was little at home
except when he was eating.