ONE OF THE SMALL DEEDS.
KATHIE'S lessons, even to her music, were perfect the next day. Indeed,
Mr. Lawrence quite complimented her.
Mrs. Alston said, "Kathie, if you would like to come over after school
and relieve me a little while, I should be very glad."
So Kathie went straight from school There was quite a crowd already.
Whole families had come in from the country, farmers with their wives
and little ones.
"What taste you do see displayed!" Lottie remarked, sauntering to
Kathie's vicinity. "Look at that woman's shawl with a yellow centre.
Isn't it hideously ugly? And that purple bonnet with red flowers! Why
didn't she put blue, by way of contrast?"
The wearer of the purple bonnet glanced at the two girls with a flushed
and rather indignant face,--a hard-featured countrywoman, neither young
nor pretty.
"O don't," whispered Kathie. "She heard you."
"As if I cared! Any person who outrages taste in that manner is a fit
subject for criticism. How horridly that gored skirt hangs! Home-made to
the last thread. If I couldn't have a dressmaker I would not have any
new dresses."
Kathie was feeling quite distressed. She disliked to have Lottie to
stand here and make remarks on every one who passed by.
"How do you make them 'ere things?" inquired a coarse but fresh young
voice at her side.
Lottie tittered, and put her handkerchief to her face.
"What?" asked Kathie, in great confusion.
"These 'ere," pointing to some very pretty moss and lichen brackets.
"The moss is fastened to a piece of wood just the right shape,--like
this"; and she turned the bracket round.
"Pasted on?"
"You could use paste or glue,--anything that adheres quickly."
"Adheres?"--with a kind of wondering stare.
"Sticks!" exclaimed Lottie, in a peculiar tone.
"I wasn't talking to you," said the girl, rather gruffly.
Lottie tossed her head with a world of scorn, and moved a little lower
down to speak to some stylish friends that she saw coming.
"Thinks she's dre'dful fine!" continued the girl. "You find them things
in the woods. I have lots of 'em, but I never thought o' puttin' them up
anywheres. I've some a good deal bigger 'n any you have here."
She was referring to the lichens now.
"They must be very fine," said Kathie.
"Some of 'em are pinky, and all streaked, in rows like this. Don't you
s'pose I could put 'em up? And I know Jim'd make me some fine things to
stick the moss on. He's powerful handy with tools. Means to be a
carpenter."
She was a nice, wholesome-looking girl of fifteen or thereabout. Kathie
wished that she dared to correct her words and sentences a little.
"You might make your parlor or your own room look very pretty with some
of these adornments," she remarked, with quiet interest.
"The youngsters would soon smash 'em up in my room," she said, with
rough good-nature; "but ma'am will let me fix up the parlor, I know. And
if you'd only tell me--" The girl wriggled around with painful
hesitation.
"Well?" Kathie went on, encouragingly.
"About them 'ere frames that look like straw."
"They are straw."
"There, I was sure of it! Ain't they han'some! Do you know how to make
'em?"
"Yes."
"S'pose you wouldn't like to tell me?"--bashfully.
"Why, yes," answered Kathie, smiling. "First, you find some nice, long
pieces of straw that are smooth and round, and, holding them together
this way,--four or five or six, as wide as you want your frame,--sew
them backwards and forwards with a fine needle and cotton. When you have
made your four pieces cross them so, and fasten them through on the
pictures at the corner. Then you tie a little bow over the sewing."
"Well, now, it isn't hard, after all! I mean to make some. What's the
price of that?"
"Fifty cents."
"I mean to have one of 'em. I'll hunt up mother and come back." With
that the girl dashed into the crowd.
"Profitable customer!" sneered Lottie.
Just then there was a rush to the table, and Kathie was kept very busy
for ten minutes or so, while Lottie went over to Mrs. Wilder's table and
began to "take off" Kathie's young woman, as she called her. It sounded
very funny to the group of girls, exaggerated a little by Lottie's love
of a good story.
Half an hour afterwards, when Kathie had almost forgotten, the girl came
dragging her mother rather unwillingly up to the table.
"Here she is! I've made her come, though she said fust she wouldn't. But
you was so real sweet to me that I couldn't give it up."
Kathie recognized the identical purple bonnet and dull red roses, and
she flushed a little at the woman's sharp scrutiny.
"You ain't the one that laughed awhile ago," she said, the features
relaxing a little. "City gals may think themselves a heap finer than
country folk, but I can see bad manners as quick as the next one."
"I was very sorry for it," exclaimed Kathie, in a low tone.
"Then my gal wouldn't give me any peace till I come back"--apparently
much mollified. "Now, Sary Ann, where's the picter you want?"
"O, they're all so _bew_-tiful!" exclaimed the girl. "And I know I can
make the frames after I go home. Look at this 'ere cross and this basket
of flowers, and these roses! O dear!"--in despair.
"She's so fond o' flowers,--is Sary Ann. She's had the beautifullest
garden this summer that you ever see. Well, Sary Ann? I'd take the
basket of flowers."
"But the cross!" exclaimed the girl, longingly.
They looked them over while Kathie went to wait upon another customer.
"I've concluded to get 'em both for her," announced the woman. "Sary
Ann's a real good girl, and a powerful sight o' help to me. There's six
younger 'n she, and Jim older; but boys can't do much about a house."
Kathie did up the pictures with a little sensation of triumph.
"O mother, look what a pretty baby's cap! Wouldn't it be sweet for
Lily, and you promised to buy her one the fust time you went to town."
"She would have the baby called Lily," said the woman, as if in apology.
"What's the price of this?"
"Two dollars and a half."
"O, that's too dear."
"We have cheaper ones."
"But this is such a beauty," said Sary Ann.
"I crocheted it myself," Kathie returned, quietly.
"O mother, I'd like to have something she's done her own very self! Did
you make the frames?"
"No, my aunt did those, but I know how,"--with a sweet smile.
After a good deal of talking they concluded to take the cap; then Sary
Ann wanted a pretty white apron for the "patron" of it, she declared.
"Nonsense!" said her mother.
But Sary Ann carried the day, and afterward she found something else.
Altogether the bill amounted to seven dollars and sixty-four cents. Not
so bad, after all. The woman paid it without a bit of grumbling.
"It's a good cause," she said. "I often think of the poor fellows out
there," nodding her head; "and sence the Lord gives 'em strength and
courage to go, we ought to do something besides prayin' for 'em. My old
man he put up a lot of turkeys an' chickens, an' apples and onions, an'
sez he, 'Though we ain't any children out there, we've neighbors and
friends, and every chap among the lot deserves a Thanksgiving dinner.'"
Kathie forgot all about the red and purple, thinking of the red, white,
and blue, and of the tender place in this woman's heart.
"I want to give you a little picture to frame," she said to "Sary Ann";
"it will help you to remember me, as well as the cause."
It was a pretty colored photograph of two children,--"The
Reconciliation."
The girl was so delighted that the quick tears sprang to her eyes.
"There's no fear of my forgetting you," she declared, warmly. "I've had
a splendid time!"
Kathie opened her portmonnaie and dropped the quarter in the drawer. Her
mother had taught her to be scrupulously honest about such matters, and
she wanted the gift to be altogether hers.
It was getting quite dusky now. Uncle Robert had brought Mrs. Alston
over in the pony-carriage, and was to take Kathie back, "to smooth her
ruffled plumes," the child said; for the knot of girls around Emma
Lauriston had been discussing what they would wear.
"There'll be a great jam here to-night," said one. "Everybody will turn
out, and I want to look as pretty as possible."
Kathie had begun to have some rather troublesome thoughts on the subject
of dress. The larger girls at school talked considerably of the
fashions. She realized her own position much better than she had a year
ago, and knew that a certain style was expected of her. She hated to be
considered mean or shabby, or, worst of all, deficient in taste; yet how
much of it was right? Need it occupy all one's time and one's desires?
She felt very strongly inclined to make herself "gorgeous" to-night, as
Rob would have phrased it; yet the only ornament she indulged in was a
little cluster of flowers at her throat.
A jam it was, sure enough. Everybody had to look half a dozen ways at
once. The hum of the laughing and talking almost drowned the music. By
nine o'clock some of the tables began to wear a rather forlorn aspect,
and two or three "shut up shop," having been entirely sold out.
Miss Weston's luck appeared less brilliant than that of many others.
"I wish you could take some one there who would buy ever so many
things," Kathie said to Uncle Robert; "I am afraid she is feeling a good
deal discouraged."
He smiled at the thoughtfulness, but made no immediate reply. Only
Kathie noticed his standing there a considerable length of time.
When he came back to her he said, softly, "Kathie, will you not come and
keep her table for a little while? I want to take her to the supper-room
for some refreshments."
Kathie gave him a rather beseeching look.
"I'll be sure and not let her spend more than fifteen minutes. After
that we will have a gay promenade."
Was it selfish not to want to stay here? Yet Kathie put on her most
attractive smiles and actually sold several articles while Miss Weston
was gone.
Then, hunting up Emma Lauriston, they set out on a tour, Uncle Robert
said. They went to the Dutch kitchen, where Miss Jessie was one of the
"young ladies" to-night; and very pretty she looked, though Uncle Robert
insisted that she could not talk a word of Dutch. They had cream
afterward, candy, nuts, and fruit, until it appeared to Kathie that she
had eaten enough to last a week.
There had been a discussion at first about continuing the Fair on
Thanksgiving day, but, as the articles were so nearly sold out, it was
decided to have an auction. That made great fun indeed. By eleven
o'clock the tables were emptied, and the refreshments reduced to a
rather fragmentary state. The crowd, too, began to thin out.
Such a hunting for baskets and hampers and boxes of every description,
such a hurrying and scurrying and confusion of voices, was seldom
witnessed in quiet Brookside. In the crowd Kathie ran over Lottie.
"O dear!" the latter exclaimed, fretfully, "aren't you half tired to
death, Kathie Alston? I've ruined my dress too,--this lovely blue silk!
I am sure I don't know what ma will say. Some one trod on it, as I was
sitting down, and tore off the trimming, and that clumsy Harry Cox
spilled lemonade on me. Children ought not to be allowed in such places,
especially boys who do not know how to behave!" and she uttered this
with a great deal of emphasis. "And I've lost one of my new kid gloves.
They were such a lovely shade. There is nothing in Brookside like them!
"She ought to have known better than to dress in such state, as if she
was going to a party," whispered Emma Lauriston. "I am cream and pie and
cake-crumbs, and goodness only knows what, and devoutly thankful that I
shall not have to go to school to-morrow. But it _has_ been a success.
Mrs. Wilder made one hundred and forty dollars at her table,--our
table," with a laugh.
"And mamma has made nearly two hundred."
"I long to hear the aggregate."
"It will not be less than two thousand," exclaimed Uncle Robert, trying
to open a path for the girls.
Kathie was very tired when she reached home, and with a good-night kiss
ran off to her own room, where she fell asleep with a strange jumble of
ideas in her head.
Two thousand three hundred and twenty dollars for the widows and orphans
when all expenses were paid. Everybody felt very well satisfied, and,
after a good Thanksgiving dinner, affairs at Brookside rolled on as
calmly as before.
Except, perhaps, that there were more anxious hearts. General Sherman
was sweeping on to the sea, and brave Sheridan was carrying
consternation to the heart of the enemy by his daring raids. Grant was
drawing nearer and nearer to Richmond, but there would be some pretty
hard work at the last, every one thought.
Some days afterward Kathie finished a letter to Mr. Meredith, giving him
a glowing account of their labors at home.
"If he could come back to keep Christmas with us!" Kathie said,
longingly. "And dear Rob--and O, the hundreds more who are away from
pleasant firesides!"
Uncle Robert decided to pay Rob a Christmas visit, and they concluded to
pack a small box to send. He was so fond of "goodies" that Kathie tried
her hand at some of the Fair recipes and had excellent success. A few
new articles were needed for every-day use, but these comprised only a
very small share.
"He will have quite a feast," Kathie said, delightedly. "And there is
not much fear of Rob being like Harry in the story."
Uncle Robert would be back by Christmas. They had planned to have a tree
again, but Kathie declared that she could not think of a single thing
she needed. She was quite busy with various other little matters,
however, that required strict seclusion in her own room.
How different it was from last year! She and Aunt Ruth talked it
over,--the waiting, the disappointment, and the sacrifice that after all
had ended so happily.
"It seemed as if everything must have happened then, and that there
would be nothing left for this year," she said.
Uncle Robert brought most satisfactory accounts from his nephew. Rob was
well, contented and happy, and growing tall in an astonishing manner. He
sent oceans of love and thanks to everybody, and wished that he could
come home and see them.
"And here is a letter for you," said Kathie, taking it from the rack on
his desk. "It is from Mr. Meredith. See if he is not going to surprise
us. The ninety days will soon be ended."
Uncle Robert sat before the grate fire, sunning himself in the cheerful
glow, but Kathie remarked that his face grew very grave.
"What is it?" she asked, anxiously. "He is not sick, or--"
"He is well. You may read this."
He folded down a little slip at the top and handed the letter to the
child, who read:--
"Tell Kathie that I have seen General Mackenzie, her hero of last
winter, and that he was delighted to have some tidings of her. And that
during the last fortnight my ideas and sphere of duty seem to have
enlarged. I think she will approve of my decision,--my brave little
Captain who stood by her colors so nobly last winter, and preferred to
minister to her suffering aunt rather than share the most tempting
pleasures. So I shall give up my own comfort and idleness awhile longer,
and stand by the dear country that needs every man in this last great
struggle."
"Oh!" with a tender little cry. "He is not coming home!"
"No. He has resolved to stay and see the war through," was the grave
reply.
Kathie looked into the glowing fire. It was very brave and noble in him
for he did _not_ like military life under the auspices in which he was
seeing it.
"There is a little more," Uncle Robert said.
The "little more" brought the tears to her eyes. She stooped and laid
her head on Uncle Robert's shoulder, nestling her face in the corner by
his curly beard.
"He thinks--it will be--all right with him," she whispered, tremulously,
a little sob quivering in her voice.
"Living or dying," returned Uncle Robert, solemnly. "My darling, I am
very grateful for your share in the work. It seems to me that Mr.
Meredith is capable of something really grand if he can once be roused
to a sense of the responsibility and preciousness of life. There is so
much for every one to do."
"But it doesn't seem as if I did anything."
"No act is without some result, my dear child, when we think that it
must all bear fruit, and that we shall see the result in the other
country, whether it be brambles or leaves or fruit; and we cannot bear
fruit except we abide in the Master."
It seemed to Kathie, child as she was, that she had a blessed glimpse of
the light and the work, the interest and sympathy, the prayers and
earnest endeavor, which were to go side by side with the Master's. A
warm, vivifying glow sped through every pulse. Was this the love of
God,--the grace which was promised to well-doing? She hardly dared
believe, it was so solemnly sweet and comforting,--too good for her, she
almost thought.
"You see, little one, that _He_ puts work for us everywhere, that his
love and presence is beside it always. We may wait a long while for the
result, yet it is sure. And we need not be sparing of our seed; the
heavenly storehouse is forever open to us. He is always more ready to
give than we to receive."
"O Uncle Robert! I am so glad for--for Mr. Meredith. It seems as if I
couldn't take it all in at once!" and both of Kathie's arms were around
his neck, her soft, rosy cheek, wet with tears, pressed against his.
"It is something to think of for all time, my darling."
"Uncle Robert," she said, after a long, thoughtful pause, in which she
appeared to have glimpses of the life stretching out before her, and
leading to the gate of the other country, "I used to wish that I could
have--religion--myself, like mamma and Aunt Ruth--"
"My little Kathie, the 'kingdom of heaven' is within you. We have only
to do _His_ will, and we shall know of the doctrine. That is the grand
secret of it all."