"I've heard folks say it--I've seen it in a book myself--and I heard my
father read something like it, out of the Bible, last Sunday--`Ask, and
ye shall receive,' and in another place, `In everything by prayer and
supplication let your requests be made known unto God.' I might try it,
anyway."
But the voice that spoke was by no means a hopeful one, and there was
anything but a hopeful look on the face of the little girl who slowly
raised herself up from a mossy seat, where she had been quite hidden by
the branches of a tall birch-tree, that hung so low as to dip themselves
into the waters of the brook at the times when it ran fullest. It was a
very pretty place, and a very strange place for any child to look
anxious or discontented in. But the little girl looked as if she were
both; and there was, besides, a great deal of weariness in her manner,
as she leaned for a moment against a branch, and then stooped to let the
water flow over a spray of crimson maple that she held in her hand.
"I might try it, anyway," she repeated, as she left the place.
In some spring or autumn long ago, the swollen waters of the brook had
quite washed away the soil from between the roots of the birch-tree; and
the roots themselves, and the hollow place which the waters had made,
were covered with grass and soft moss now. In this pretty natural seat,
after an eager, half-frightened glance around, the little girl placed
herself, kneeling. She closed her eyes, and folded her hands with a
reverent gesture; but a doubtful, uneasy look passed over her face as
she let her head droop, and murmured:
"Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come"--
and so on to the end.
Then her head was raised; but the doubtful look had not passed away.
"That's no' just what I'm needing," she continued. "I have my daily
bread. I'm no' sure about the other things; and I canna mind another
prayer. I would make one, if I knew the way. I need so many things!"
There was a pause, and then she said, softly:
"O Lord, dinna let Aunt Elsie be vexed with me for biding here so long.
I'm sure I need that. And, O Lord, mind Effie to bring home the book
she promised me. Oh, there are so many things that I need! and I'm no'
sure that I'm asking right. But the Bible says, `Whatsoever ye ask in
My name, believing, ye shall receive.'"
She slipped from her kneeling posture, and leaned, with her eyes still
closed, against the shining bark of the birch-tree. She lay quiet for
some time, as if she were thinking of many things; then, kneeling again,
with her head bowed down on her clasped hands, she said:
"O Lord, make me a good child, and take me to heaven when I die, for
Jesus' sake!"
Then she opened her eyes, and rose up with a sigh.
"Oh, how long the shadows have grown! I should have been at home a long
while ago. But now I'll see if Aunt Elsie's no' vexed. If she doesna
scold me, I'll ken that there is some use in praying. And if Effie
brings me a book, such a book as I like, I shall be sure, _sure_. Then
I shall know that God hears people when they pray; and that will be
something."
And, really, the tired, pale little creature looked as though she needed
something to make her look more cheerfully on a world which generally
seems so happy a place to the young--something to banish the look of
discontent which seemed to have settled on her face.
This was little Christie Redfern--just such a plain, common-looking
child as one might see anywhere without turning to look again. Her eyes
were neither black nor blue, but grey, and dark only when the long
lashes shaded them. Her mouth was too wide to be pretty, and her lips
were pale and thin. She might naturally have had a fair, soft skin; but
it was tanned and freckled by exposure to the air and sun, and looked
neither fair nor soft now. Her brow was high and broad, and would have
been pretty but that she gathered it together in wrinkles when she
looked at anything closely with her short-sighted eyes. She wore a dark
cotton frock and checked pinafore, and her feet, without stockings, were
slipped into shoes that seemed a world too big for them. She would not
have been pretty in any circumstances; but shuffling along in her big
shoes and odd dress, she was a very queer-looking little creature
indeed.
But there was something about the child more to be deplored than the
wide mouth, or the dim eyes, or the drooping figure. There was a look
of unhappiness upon her face which, as any one might see, was in
consequence of no momentary trouble. It seemed to be habitual. As she
plodded along with her eyes cast down on the rough pathway, it never
changed. Once, when the sun, which she thought had set, flashed out for
a moment through the clouds of purple and crimson, causing her to look
up suddenly, the sad expression passed away; but when her eyes fell it
was there again, and she sighed wearily, as though her thoughts were
always sad. It was a long time before she looked up again.
Indeed, there was not very much in the scene around her to attract the
attention of the child, even if her short-sighted eyes could have taken
in the view. There were the clouds; but their crimson and purple
glories had faded. There was the little grove of birch and maple by the
side of the brook--the prettiest place on her father's farm, Christie
thought; and that was all. A bird's-eye view of the country for many
miles around showed no variety of scenery, except the alternation of
long, broad fields of grass and wheat, or, rather, fields where grass
and wheat had been, with wide, irregular stretches of low-lying forest.
There was scarcely a hill deserving of the name to break the monotonous
level. It was a very fine country indeed in the estimation of the busy
groups who were here and there gathering in the last sheaves of a
plentiful harvest. The farmers of Laidlaw were wont to boast, and with
reason, too, of their wheat-crops, and their fine roads and fences,
declaring that there was not in all Canada a district that would surpass
or even equal theirs in respect of these things. But beauty of this
sort a child cannot be supposed to appreciate. Christie's home for the
first ten years of her life had been in a lovely Scottish village,
within three miles of the sea on one side and less than three miles from
the hills on the other; and the dull, unvaried level, the featureless
aspect of her present home, might well seem dreary to the child.
But the contrast between the old life and the new was greater still; and
here lay the secret of the shadow that seldom left the face of the
little girl now. For in the old times, that seemed so long ago,
Christie had been the one delicate child in a large and healthy family,
and therefore her loving mother's constant and peculiar care. And her
mother was dead now. I need not say more to prove how sad and changed
her life had become.
I think that, meeting her on her homeward way that afternoon, one might
have almost seen the motherless look in her pale face and drooping
figure and in the lingering tread of her weary little feet. It was a
look more painful to see than the look of sadness or neglect which
motherless children sometimes wear. It was of a wayward temper grown
more wayward still for want of a mother's firm and gentle rule. One
could not doubt that peevish words and angry retorts fell very naturally
from those pale lips. She looked like one who needed to be treated with
patience and loving forbearance, and who failed to meet either. And,
indeed, the rule to which Christie was forced to submit was neither firm
nor gentle. Sometimes it was firm, when Christie, as she not
unfrequently did, ventured to resist it; but gentle--never.
When Christie's mother died, all their friends said the little Redferns
were very fortunate in having an Aunt Elsie to supply her place in the
household; and in some respects they were. If a constant and
conscientious determination to do her duty to her brother's motherless
children would have made up to them for their loss, they would have been
quite happy under Aunt Elsie's care. She made a great sacrifice of her
own ease and comfort when she left her quiet home to devote herself to
their interests; and if they had all been wise and good and thoughtful,
they would not have needed to be reminded so frequently of her
self-denial as Aunt Elsie seemed to think necessary. But few children
are so wise, or good, or thoughtful as they ought to be; and there were
oftentimes secret murmurings, and once or twice during the first year of
her stay there had been open rebellion among them.
It could hardly have been otherwise. No middle-aged woman unaccustomed
to the care of a family, whose heart had never been softened by the
helpless loveliness of little children of her own, could have filled the
place of a mother, wise, firm, and tender, all at once; and so for a
time their household was not a happy one. Their father left his
children to the care of their aunt, as he had always left them to the
care of their mother; and if an appeal from any decision of hers were
made to him, it very seldom availed anything.
It was not so bad for the elder ones. They were healthy, good-tempered
girls, who had companions and interests out of the home-circle; and they
soon learned to yield to or evade what was distasteful in their aunt's
rule. With the little children she was always lenient. It was the
sickly, peevish little Christie who suffered most. More than any of the
rest, more than all the rest put together, she missed her mother: she
missed her patient care and sympathy when she was ill, and her firm yet
gentle management amid the wayward fretfulness that illness brought upon
her. Night after night did her weary little head slumber on a pillow
which her tears had wet. Morning after morning did she wake up to the
remembrance of her loss, with a burst of bitter weeping, angry at or
indifferent to all her aunt's attempts to console her or win her love.
No wonder that her aunt lost patience at last, calling the child peevish
and wilful, and altogether unlovable, and declaring that she had more
trouble and unhappiness with her than with all her sisters put together.
And, indeed, so she had. She rather enjoyed the excitement of keeping a
firm hand over the elder ones, and she soon learned to have patience
with the noise and heedlessness of the little ones. But the peevishness
and wayward fancies of a nervous, excitable child, whom weakness made
irritable, and an over-active imagination made dreams, she could neither
understand nor endure; and so the first year after the mother's death
was a year of great unhappiness to Christie.
After that, there was a great change in the family life. Losses in
business, and other circumstances, induced Mr Redfern to give up his
home and to remove with his family to Canada. Though this decision was
made contrary to the advice of his sister, she would not forsake him and
his children: so she had come with them to the backwoods.
A new and changed life opened to them here, and all the changes that
came to them were not for the better. Mr Redfern knew nothing about
practical farming; and so, though he had means to purchase a sufficient
quantity of good land, it was not surprising to his neighbours that his
first attempt should be unsuccessful. His children were of the wrong
sort, too, his neighbours said; for only one of the eight was a lad, and
he was only six when he came to his new home. No pair of hands could
gather, from ever so good a farm, food enough to fill so many mouths;
and more than one of the kind people who took the affairs of the
new-comers into their especial consideration, shook their heads gravely
over their prospects. And for a time they were badly off.
Soon after their arrival in their new home, Aunt Elsie was seized with
an illness which lingered long, and left her a cripple when it went
away; and her temper was not of the kind which suffering and
helplessness are said sometimes to improve. It was a trying time to
all.
But winter passed over. Spring came, and with it came a measure of
health to Aunt Elsie. She could move about on a crutch and give
directions in the house, and do many things besides, which a less
energetic person would never have attempted. The elder girls, Effie,
Sarah, and Annie, proved themselves of the right sort, so far as energy,
and strength, and a right good-will were concerned, and worked in the
fields with their father as though they had been accustomed to it all
their lives. So, when two or three years had passed away, the glances
which the neighbours sent into the future of the Redferns revealed by no
means so dreary a prospect as formerly.
A change for the better had come over Christie, too. She would never be
as hopeful or as healthy as her sisters, her aunt said; but in health
and hopefulness, and in temper too, there was a great change for the
better in Christie at the end of the first three years of her Canadian
life. But Christie was far from being what she ought to be in respect
to the latter item even then, as her aunt often told her; and she had
good cause to be of her aunt's opinion many times before the summer was
over.
It was, for several reasons, a time of trial to the child. Her eldest
sister Effie, whom she loved best of all, was away from home as
school-mistress in a neighbouring township, only returning home for the
Sunday, and not always able to do that. Her absence made the constant
assistance of Sarah and Annie indispensable to their father. So the
work of the household, and the care of the dairy during the greater part
of the summer, fell to Christie, under the superintendence of Aunt
Elsie; and a great deal more strength and patience was needed than
Christie had at her disposal. She would gladly have changed with her
sisters for their harder places in the fields; but the cold of the
spring and autumn mornings chilled her, and the heat of summer exhausted
her, and there was no alternative but the work of the house. This would
have been wearisome enough under any circumstances to a child not very
strong; and it was sometimes rendered more than wearisome by the
needless chidings of her aunt.
Not that her aunt meant to be unkind, or that her chidings were always
undeserved or her complaints causeless. Her mother could not have been
more careful than her aunt was, that Christie should not put her hand to
work beyond her strength. But probably her mother would have felt that
a child might become weary, even to disgust, of a never-ending,
never-changing routine of trifling duties, that brought no pleasant
excitement in their train, that could scarcely be named or numbered when
the day was done, yet whose performance required time and strength and
patience beyond her power to give. But if her aunt ever thought about
this, she never told her thoughts to Christie; and to the child the
summer days often passed wearily enough. It is to be doubted whether
the elder sisters, after a long harvest-day, went to bed more tired and
depressed than did Christie, who, in their opinion, had been having an
easy time. Not but that Annie and Sarah understood in some measure the
troubles that might fall to Christie's lot under the immediate
superintendence of Aunt Elsie; and they were sometimes ready enough to
congratulate themselves on their own more free life out of doors. But,
strong and healthy as they were, they could not understand how the work
which would have seemed like play to them could be such a burden to
their little sister; and they sometimes sadly added to her discontent by
making light of her troubles, and ascribing to indolence and peevishness
the complaints which, too often, fell from her lips.
There had not, during all the summer, been a more uncomfortable day than
the one whose close found Christie sitting so disconsolately under the
birch-tree by the brook. It had begun badly, as too many of those days
did. In looking for something in the garret, Christie had found a book
that had been missing for a long time. It was one of her favourites.
She had read it often before, but not recently; and in those days new
books were rare, and old books proportionably precious.
Sitting down on the floor, amid the scattered contents of the chest she
had been rummaging, she forgot, in the charm of "The Family Tryst," that
the dough of her batch of bread was fast approaching that stage of
lightness that needed her attention, and that her oven was by no means
in a proper state to receive it when that point should be reached. Page
after page she turned with a vague feeling that each should be the last,
till even this half-consciousness of wrong-doing was lost in the intense
enjoyment of the tale; and then--the charm was broken.
Aunt Elsie's sharp, quick tones, coming suddenly upon her, must have
startled the nervous child with a shock of pain quite apart from any
thought of the consequences of her fault; and it was with hands that
trembled violently that the book was hidden and the scattered contents
of the chest were gathered together again. Then she thought of her
bread; and her heart failed within her.
"Oh, I'm so sorry!" she said to herself; but no such word was spoken to
her aunt. Indeed, to her she said nothing; and it was not sorrow for
her fault, but sullenness or indifference, or something that might
easily be mistaken for these, that her aunt saw on her face as she came
down-stairs. It was very provoking. The bread was ready for the oven,
but the oven was by no means ready for the bread. And now for the next
three days, at least, the children and the hungry harvest-people must
content themselves with sour bread, in consequence of Christie's
carelessness. It was Christie's wilful disobedience, her aunt declared;
and, really, the sullen, unrepentant look on the girl's face was almost
enough to excuse her aunt's bitter words and the sudden blow that fell
on her averted cheek. A blow was a very rare thing with Aunt Elsie. It
was not repeated now. Indeed, she would hardly have ventured to strike
again the white, indignant face that was turned towards her. Surprise
and anger kept the girl for one moment silent; then, in a voice she
could hardly make audible for the beating of her heart, she gasped:
"I hate you, Aunt Elsie! I wish I were dead!"
"Be quiet, with your wicked words!" cried Aunt Elsie. "You are far from
being in a fit state to die, you disobedient, bad child."
But Aunt Elsie was vexed with herself for the blow she had given, and
all the more vexed with Christie on that account. Christie was really
sorry for her fault; but, quite forgetting that she had given no sign of
sorrow, she called her aunt unjust and cruel, and bitterly resented both
word and blow. Anger and pride gave her strength to obey the command to
carry the bread to a cool place, and to keep back a rush of tears till
her task was done. But it failed her then; and, throwing herself on the
ground, out of sight, she wept and sobbed, and uttered words as wicked
and passionate as those which her aunt had reproved.
This was the beginning; and after that nothing could be expected to go
well. Though her head ached and her hands trembled, the work of the
house must be done; and more than her usual share fell to Christie
to-day. For Aunt Elsie's rheumatism was bad again, and much that she
usually did was left to Christie. But her aunt did not say she was ill.
The added tasks were assigned with a voice and in a manner that seemed
to declare them a part of the punishment for the fault of the morning;
and we cannot wonder much that they were sullenly performed.
"I don't care," repeated Christie to herself, over and over again, that
day. "There is no use in trying to please Aunt Elsie. It makes no
difference. She's cross always. I never do anything right, she says;
and I don't care!"
But she did care, for all that. She was very wretched. She avoided her
sisters when they came home to dinner, saying she had a headache, and
didn't want any--which, indeed, was true; and her sisters, thinking that
she and Aunt Elsie had had a falling-out which would be made up before
night, left her to herself. So Christie sat on the garret-floor, too
miserable to read, her heart full of angry thoughts against her aunt,
her sisters, and all the world.
But into the very midst of her vexed and angry murmurs against them
there came the feeling that all the fault was not theirs--that she was
herself to be blamed. And by and by the anger passed away; but the
misery remained, and oftener, and with more power, came the
consciousness that she was a very cross, unamiable child, that she was
not like her older sisters or the little ones, that she was a comfort to
no one, but a vexation to all. If she only could die! she thought. No!
she would be afraid to die! But, oh, if she had never been born! Oh,
if her mother had not died!
And yet she might have been a trial to her mother, too, as she was to
all the rest. But no! she thought; her mother would have loved her and
had patience with her; and Aunt Elsie never had. Amid a rush of angry
tears, there fell a few very bitter drops to the memory of her mother.
With a weary pain at her head and heart, she went about the household
work of the afternoon. The dinner-dishes were put away, and the room
was swept and dusted, in silence. The pans were prepared for the
evening milk, and the table was laid for supper; and then she sat down,
with a face so woe-begone and miserable, and an air so weary that, even
in spite of her anger, her aunt could not but pity her. She pitied
herself more, however. She said to herself that she was at her wits'
end with the wilful child. She began to fear that she would never be
other than a cross and a trial to her; and it did seem to Aunt Elsie
that, with her bad health and her hard work among her brother's
children, she had enough to vex her without Christie's untowardness. It
did seem so perverse in her, when she needed her help so much, to be so
heedless and sullen.
"And yet what a poor, pale, unhappy little creature she seems to be!"
thought she. "Maybe I haven't all the patience with her that I ought to
have. God knows, I need not a little to bear all my own aches and
pains."
But her relenting thoughts did not take the form of words; and Christie
never fancied, when she was bidden go for the cows at once, and not wait
for the coming of the children from school, that her aunt sent her
because she thought the walk to the pasture would do her good. She
believed it was a part of her punishment, still, that she should be
required to do what had all the summer been the acknowledged work of
Will and her little sisters. So, though she was too weary and miserable
to resist, or even to murmur, she went with a lagging step and a
momentary rising of her old angry and resentful thoughts.
It was not very far to the pasture through the wheat-field; and she was
soon there. But when the cows had passed through the gate she let them
go or not, just as they pleased, and turned aside, to think over again,
by the side of the brook, the miserable thoughts of the afternoon; and
the end of these was the murmured prayer with which my story began.
Her thoughts were not very cheerful as she plodded along. She had no
wish to hurry. If she did, she would very likely have to milk Brownie
and Blackie and the rest, besides Fleckie, her own peculiar care. She
said to herself, there was no reason why she should do her sisters'
work, though it was harvest-time and they would come home tired. She
was tired too--though nobody seemed to think she ever did anything to
tire her. She could milk all the cows well enough. She had done it
many a time. But it was one thing to do it of her own free will, and
quite another to do so because her aunt was cross and wanted to punish
her for her morning fault. So she loitered on the road, though the sun
had set and she knew there was danger of the cows passing the gate and
getting in among the wheat, where the fence was insufficient, in the
field below.
"I don't care," she said to herself. "It winna be my fault. The bairns
should have been at home. It's their work, not mine, to mind the cows.
Oh, I wist Effie was at home! There's nothing quite so bad where she is
here. But I'll see to-night if my prayer is heard; that will be
something; and then I'll begin again, and try to be good, in spite of
Aunt Elsie."