"Settin' out in the road."
"And where's it goin'?"
"Up to her room. She'll shew you."
Rotha mounted the stairs again, preceding Joe and her trunk, and feeling more utterly desolate than it is easy to describe. Shut up here, at the top of this great empty house, and with these associates! Her heart almost failed her.
"Well, you've got it slicked up here, nice!" was Mr. Purcell's declaration when he had come in and deposited the little trunk on the floor, and could look around him. "You find it pretty comfortable up here, don't you."
"It's very far from the kitchen—" said Rotha with an inward shudder.
"Well—'tis; but I don' know as that's any objection. Young feet don't mind runnin' up and down; and when you are here, you've got it to yourself. Well, you can take care o' yourself up here; and down stairs Prissy will see that you don't starve. I expect that's how it'll be." And with again an affable nod of his capable head, Mr. Purcell departed. Rotha locked the door, and went to her window; nature being the only quarter from which she could hope for a look or a tone of sympathy. The day was well on its way now, and the May sun shining warm and bringing out the spicy odours of the larches and firs. A little stir of the soft air lightly moved the small branches and twigs and caressed Rotha's cheek. A sudden impulse seized her, to rush out and get rid of the house and its inmates for a while, and be alone with the loveliness of the outer world. She threw a shawl round her, put on her straw bonnet, locked her door, and ran down.
The front door of the main hall was fast, and no key in the lock; Rotha must go out as she had come in, through the kitchen. Mrs. Purcell was there, but made no remark, and Rotha went out and made her way first of all round to the front of the house. There she sat down upon the steps and looked about her.
An unkept gravel road swept round from the gate by which she had entered, up to her feet, and following a similar curve on the other side swept round to another gate, opening on the same high-road. The whole sweep took in a semicircle of ground, which lay in grass, planted with a few trees. To explore this gravel sweep was the first obvious move. So Rotha walked down to the gate by which she had come in that morning, and then back and down to the corresponding gate on the other side. All along the way from gate to gate, there ran wide flower beds on both sides; the back of the flower beds being planted thick with trees and shrubbery. Old fashioned flowering shrubs stood in close and wildering confusion. Lilac bushes held forth brown bunches where the flowers had been. Syringas pushed sweet white blossoms between the branches of other shrubs that crowded them in. May roses were there, with their bright little red faces, modest but sweet; and Scotch roses, aromatic and wild-looking. There was a profusion of honeysuckle, getting ready to bloom; and laburnums hung out tresses of what would be soon "dropping gold." And Rotha stood still once before the snowy balls of a Guelder rose, so white and fresh and fair that they dazzled her. She went on, down to the gate furthest from Tanfield, and spent a little while there, looking up and down the road. A straight, well-kept country road it was, straight and empty. Not a house was in sight, and only farm fields on the other side of the bordering fences. Rotha would have gone out, and walked at least a rod or two, but that gate was locked. There was no traffic or intercourse in any direction but with Tanfield. The empty highway seemed very lonely and desolate to the gazer at the gate. How shut off from the world she was! shut off in one little corner where nobody would ever look for her. If Rotha had put any faith in her aunt's promises, of course she would not have minded a month's abode in this place; but she put no faith in her aunt, and had a sort of instinct that she had been sent here for no good reason, and would be allowed, or forced, to remain here for an indeterminate and possibly quite protracted length of time. The mere feeling of being imprisoned makes one long to break bounds; and so Rotha longed, impatiently, passionately; but she saw no way. A little money would enable her to do it. Alas, she had no money. Her aunt had taken care of that. After paying for her breakfast and drive, she had only a very few shillings left; not even enough to make any impression upon the good will of her guardians, or jailers. Somehow they seemed a good deal more like that than like servants.
Rotha turned despairingly away from the gate and retraced her steps, examining the old flower beds more minutely. They were terribly neglected; choked with weeds, encroached upon by the bordering box, the soil hard and unstirred for many a day. Yet there were tokens of better times. Here there was a nest of lilies of the valley; there a mat of moss pink, so bright and fresh that Rotha again stood still to admire. Daffodils peeped out their yellow faces from tufts of encumbering weeds; and stooping down, Rotha found an abundance of polyanthus scattered about among the other things, and periwinkle running wild. Nothing was seen to advantage, but a great deal was there. If I stay here, thought Rotha, I will get hold of a hoe and rake, and put things to rights. The flowers would be good friends, any way.
Coming up towards the house again, Rotha saw a road which branched off at right angles from the sweep and went straight on, parallel to the side of the house but at a good distance from it. She turned into this road. Between it and the house was one mass of thick shrubbery, thick enough and high enough to hide each from the other. Following 011, Rotha presently saw at a little distance on her right hand, the house being to the left, a black board fence with a little gate in it. The garden perhaps, she thought; but for the present she passed it. Further along, the shrubbery ceased; a few large trees giving pleasant shade and variety to the ground about the barns, which stood here in numbers. Stables, carriage house, barn, granary; there was a little settlement of outhouses. Rotha had a liking for this neighbourhood, dating from old Medwayville associations; her feet lingered; her eyes were gladly alive to notice every detail; her ears heard willingly even a distant grunting which told of the presence of the least amiable of farm-yard inhabitants, somewhere. Rotha opened a door here and there, but saw neither man nor beast. Wandering about, she found her way finally to a huge farmyard back of the barn. It was tramped with the feet of cattle, so cattle must be there at times. On one side of the farmyard she found the pig pen. It was so long since she had seen such a sight, that she stood still to watch the pigs; and while she stood there a voice almost at her elbow made her start.
"Them pigs is 'most good enough to belong to Mis' Busby, aint they?"
Mr. Purcell was coming at long strides over the barnyard, which Rotha had not ventured to cross; she had picked her way carefully along a very narrow strip of somewhat firm ground by the side of the fence. The man seemed disposed to be at least not unkindly, and Rotha could not afford to do without any of the little civility within her reach. So she answered rather according to her policy than her feeling, which latter would have bade her leave the spot immediately.
"I am no judge."
"Never see a litter o' piggies afore?"
"I suppose I have, sometime."
"Them's first-rate. Like to eat 'em?"
"Eat them!" cried Rotha. "Such young pigs?"
"Just prime now," said the man, looking at them lovingly over the fence, while grunting noses sniffing in his direction testified that the inmates of the pen knew him as well as he knew them. "Just prime; they's four, goin' on five, weeks old. Prissy's at me to give her one on 'em; and maybe I will, now you've come. I telled her it was expensive, to eat up a half a winter's stock for one dinner. I aint as extravagant as Prissy."
"How 'half a winter's stock'?" said Rotha, by way of saying something.
"Bless you, don't you see? Every one o' them fellers'd weigh two hundred by next Christmas; and that'd keep Prissy and me more'n half the winter. I s'pose you won't be here to help us eat it then?"
"Next Christmas! No," said Rotha. "I shall not be here so long as that."
"Summer's got to come first, hain't it? Well, you might be in a wuss place."
Slowly Mr. Purcell and Rotha left the pig pen and the barnyard and came out into the space between the various farm buildings.
"Where does that road lead to?" Rotha asked, pointing to one which ran on from the barns with a seemingly straight track between fields.
"That? that don't lead no wheres."
"Where should I find myself, if I followed it out to the end?"
"You'd find yourself jammed up agin the hill. Don't you see them trees? that's a hill runnin' along there."
"Running right and left? It is not high. Just a hilly ridge. What is on it?"
"Nothin's on it, but a mean little pack o' savins Aint good for nothin'; not even worth cuttin' for firewood. What ever do you s'pose hills was made for? I mean, sich hills; that haint got nothin' onto 'em but rocks. What's the use of 'em?"
"If it wasn't for hills, Mr. Purcell, your low lands would have no water; or only in a pond or a ditch here and there."
"What's the reason they wouldn't? There aint no water on the hills now."
"Springs?"
"There's springs every place. I could count you a half a dozen in less'n half a mile."
"Ay, but the springs come from the hills; and if it were not for the hills they would not be anywhere."
"O' course it's so, since you say it," said Mr. Purcell, scratching his head with a comic expression of eye;—"but I never see the world when there warn't no hills on it; and I reckon you didn't."
Rotha let the question drop.
"I s'pose you'd say, accordin' to that, the rocks made the soft soil?"
"They have made a good deal of it," said Rotha smiling.
"Whose hammer broke 'em up?"
"No hammer. But water, and weather; frost and wet and sunshine."
"Sunshine!" cried Mr. Purcell.
"They are always wearing away the rocks. They do it slowly, and yet faster than you think."
"But I'll tell you. You forget. The soil aint up there—it's down here."
"Yes, I know. I do not forget. Water brought it down."
Here Mr. Purcell went off into an enormous guffaw of laughter, amused to the last degree, and probably in doubt whether to think of his informant as befooled or befooling. He went off laughing; and Rotha returned slowly homeward. Half way towards the drive, she struck a walk which led obliquely through the tangled shrubbery to the kitchen door.
Her room, when she reached it, looked cheerful and pleasant enough. The open windows let in the air and the sunshine, and the top of the tulip tree was glittering in the warm light. At the same time the slantness of the rays shewed that the afternoon was on its way. Night was coming. And a spasm of dread seized Rotha at the thought of being up there, quite alone, away from anybody, and without guardianship or help in any occasion of need or alarm. Rotha was of a nervous and excitable temperament, a coward physically, unaccustomed to being alone or to taking care of herself. She looked forward now to the darkness with positive dread and dismay. O for her little corner room at Mrs. Mowbray's, where she was secure, and in the midst of friends! O for even her cheerless little room at her aunt's, where at least there were people below her to guard the house! Here, quite alone through the long, still nights, and nobody within even calling distance, how should she ever stand it! For a little while Rotha's wits were half paralyzed with terror. Reason then began slowly to assert herself, and the girl's natural force of character arose to struggle with the incubus of fear. She reminded herself that nothing was more unlikely than a night alarm; that the house was known to be empty of all that might tempt thieves, and that furthermore also it was in the highest degree unlikely that the neighbourhood of Tanfield harboured such characters. Probably she was safer from disturbance up here, than either at Mrs. Mowbray's or at Mrs. Busby's. But of what use was the absence of disturbance, when there was the presence of fear? Rotha reasoned in vain. She had a lively imagination; and this excellent property now played her some of the arch tricks of which it is capable. Possible disturbances occurred to her; scenes of distress arose upon her vision, so sharp and clear that she shrank from them. Probable? No, they were not; but who should say they were not possible? Had not everything improbable happened in this world, as well as the things which were reasonably to be expected? And if only possible, if they were possible, where were comfort and security to be found? Without some degree of both, Rotha felt as if she must quit the place, set out and walk to the hotel at Tanfield; only she had no money to pay her charges with if she were there.
Distress, and be it that it was unreasonable, it was very real distress, drove her at last to the refuge we all are ready to seek when we can get no other. She took her Bible and sat down with it, to try to find something that would quiet her there. Opening it aimlessly at first; then with a recollection of certain words in it, she turned to the third psalm.
"I cried unto the Lord with my voice, and he heard me out of his holy hill. Selah. I laid me down and slept; I awaked, for the Lord sustained me. I will not be afraid of thousands of people, that have set themselves against me round about."
David had more than fancied enemies to fear; he was stating an actual, not a problematical case; and yet he could say "I will not be afraid"!How was that ever possible? David was one of the Lord's people; true; but do not the Lord's people have disagreeable things happen to them? How can they, or how should they, "not be afraid"? Just to reach that blessed condition of fearlessness was Rotha's desire; the way she saw not. There was a certain comfort in the fact that other people had seen it and found it; but how should she? Rotha had none to ask beside her Bible, so she went to that Query, do the books and helps which keep us from applying to the Bible, act as benefits or hindrances?
Rotha would have been greatly at a loss, however, about carrying on her inquiry, if it had not been for her "Treasury of Scripture Knowledge."
Turning to it now as to a most precious friend, she took the words in the psalm she had been reading for her starting place. And the very first next words she was directed to were these:—
"I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep; for thou, Lord, only makest me to dwell in safety." Ps. iv. 8.
Rotha stopped and laid down her face in her hands. O if she could quietly say that! O what a life must it be, when any one can simply and constantly say that! "Lay me down and sleep"; give up the care of myself; feel secure. But in the midst of danger, how can one? Rotha thought she must be a poor, miserable fraction of a Christian, to be so far from the feeling of the psalm; and probably she was right. "If ye had faith asa grain of mustard seed," the Lord used to say to his disciples; so apparently in his view they had scarce any faith at all. And who of us is better? How many of us can remove mountains? Yet faith as big as a grain of mustard seed can do that. What must our faith be? Not quite a miserable sham, but a miserable fraction. Rotha felt self-reproved, convicted, longing; however she did not see how she was at once to become better. She lifted her eyes, wet with sorrowful drops, and went on. If there were help, the Bible must shew it. Her next passage was the following:—
"It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows; for so he giveth his beloved sleep."—Ps. cxxvii. 2.
Studying this a good while, in the light of her fears and wants, Rotha came to a sense of the exquisite beauty of it; which wiser heads than hers, looking at the words merely in cool speculation, do fail to find. She saw that the toiling and moiling of men passes away from the Lord's beloved; that what those try for with so much pains and worry, these have without either; and in the absolute rest of faith can sleep while the Lord takes care. His people are quiet, while the world wear themselves out with anxiety and endeavour.
"His beloved."—I cannot have got to that, thought Rotha. I am not one of them. But I must be. That is what I want to be.
The next thing was a promise to the Israelites, as far back as Moses' time; that if they kept the ways of the Lord, among other blessings of peace should be this: that they should lie down and none should make them afraid; but Rotha thought that hardly applied, and went further. Then she came to the word in the third of Proverbs, also spoken to the man who should "keep wisdom":—
"When thou liest down, thou shalt not be afraid; yea, thou shalt lie down, and thy sleep shall be sweet."—Prov. iii. 24.
It set Rotha pondering, this and the former passage. Is it because I am so far from God, then? because I follow and obey him so imperfectly? that I am so troubled with fear. Quite reasonable, if it is so. Naturally, the sheep that are nearest the shepherd, feel most of his care. What next? It gave her a stir, what came next: It was in the time of the early church; James, the first martyr among the apostles, had been beheaded by Herod's order; and seeing that this was agreeable to the fanatical Jews, he had apprehended Peter also and put him in ward; waiting only till the feast of the Passover should be out of the way, before he brought him forth to execution. And it was the night preceding the day which should be the day of execution; "and the same night Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains." Chained to a Roman soldier on one side of him, and to another on the other side of him, on no soft bed, and expecting a speedy summons to death,Peter was sleeping. All sorts of characters do sleep, it is said, the night before the day when they know they are to be put to death; in weariness, in despair, in stolid indifference, in stoical calmness, in proud defiance. But Rotha knew it was upon no such slumbers that the "light shined in the prison," and to no such sleeper that the angel of the Lord came, or ever does come. That was the sleep of meekness and trust.
The list of passages given by the "Treasury" on that clause of the third psalm here came to an end. Rotha had not enough, however; she took up the words in the 6th verse—"I will not be afraid," etc. And then she came to the burst of confident triumph in the 27th psalm. And then,
"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea."—Ps. xlvi. 1, 2.
Here was a new feature. Trouble might come, yea, disaster; and yet the children of God would not fear. How that? Such absolute love, such perfect trust, such utter devotion to the pleasure of their Father, that what was his will became their will, and they knew no evil could really touch them? It must be so. O but this is a step further in the divine life. Or does this devotion lie also at the bottom of all those declarations of content and peace she had been reading? Rotha believed it must, after she had studied the question a little. O but what union with God is here; what nearness to him; what consequent lofty and sweet elevation beyond the reach of earthly trouble. Rotha got no further. She saw, in part at least, what she wanted; and falling on her knees there by the open window, she prayed that the peace and the life and the sweetness of the May might come into her heart, by the perfecting of love and faith and obedience there. She prayed for protection in her loneliness, and for the trust which saves from fear of evil. A great asking! but great need makes bold. She prayed, until it seemed as if she could pray no longer; and then she went back to her Bible again. But gradually there began to grow up a feeling in Rotha, that round the walls of her room there was an invisible rampart of defence which nothing evil could pass. And when one of her Bible references took her to the story of Elisha, shut up in a city enclosed by an army of enemies, but whose servant's eyes in answer to his prayer were opened to see "the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha"—her faith made a sort of spring. She too seemed to have a sight of the invisible forces, mostly undreamed of because unseen, which keep guard around the Lord's people; and she bowed her head in a sort of exulting gladness. Why this was even better than to need no defence, to know that such defence was at hand. Without danger there could be no need of guard; and is not such unseen ministry a glorious companionship? and is it not sweeter to know oneself safe in the Lord's hand, than to be safe, if that could be, anywhere else?
I have learned one thing, said Rotha to herself, as she rose to make some final arrangements for the evening. I wonder if I came here partly to learn this? But what can I have been brought here for, indeed? There is some reason. There is the promise that everything shall work for good to them that love God; so according to that, my coming here must work good for me. But how possibly? What am I to do, or to learn, here? It must be one thing or the other. My learning in general seems to be stopped, except Bible learning. Well, I will carry that on. I shall have time enough. What else in all the world can I do?
Her unfinished calico dresses occurred to her. There was work for some days at least. Perhaps by that time she would know more. For the present, with a glad step and a lightened heart she went about her room, arranging certain things in what she thought the prettiest and most convenient way; got out some clothes, and even work; and then wished she had a book. Where was she to get books to read? and how could she live without them? This question was immediately so urgent that she could not wait to have it settled; she must go down without delay to Mrs. Purcell, and see if any information respecting it was to be had in that quarter.
The kitchen was all "redd up," as neat as wax; everything in its place; and at the table stood Mrs. Purcell with her sleeves rolled up to her elbows and her arms in a great pan, hard at work kneading bread. She looked clean too, although her dress was certainly dilapidated; perhaps that was economy, though a better economy would have mended it. So Rotha thought. She did not at once start the business she had come upon; she stood by the table watching the bread-making operation. Mrs. Purcell eyed her askance. This woman had most remarkable eyes. Black they were, as sloes, and almond shaped; and they could look darker than black, and fiery at the same time; and they could look keen and sly and shrewd, and that is the way they looked out of their corners at Rotha now, with an element of suspicion. A little while without speech. She was kneading her dough vigorously; the large smooth mass rolling and turning under her strong wrists and fingers with quick and thorough handling.
"Isn't that rather hard work?" Rotha said.
"I think all work's hard," was the morose-sounding answer.
"Do you? But it would be harder not to do any."
"That's how folks looks at it. I'd rather eat bread than make it. There aint no fun in work. I'd like to sit down and have somebody work for me. That's what you've been doin' all your life, aint it?"
"Not quite," said Rotha gravely.
"Can you make bread?"
"No."
"Then I s'pose you think I'll make your bread for you while you are here?"
"I do not think about it," said Rotha with spirit. "I have nothing to do with it. My aunt sent me here. If you cannot keep me, or do not wish to keep me, that is your affair. I will go back again."
"What did you come for?"
"I told you; my aunt was leaving home."
"Joe says, there's fish in the brook that'll jump at a fly made o' muslin—but I aint that sort o' fish. I didn't engage to make no bread for Mis' Busby when I come here."
"Shall I write to my aunt, then, that it is not convenient for me to stay here."
"You can if you like, for itaintconvenient; but it's no use; for Mr. Purcell don't care, and Mis' Busby don't care. I'll make all the bread you'll eat; I guess."
"What do Mrs. Busby and Mr. Purcell not care about?"
"They don't care whether I make bread all day, or not."
"I hope it will not be for long," said Rotha, "that I shall give you this trouble."
"I don't know how long it will be," said Mrs. Purcell, making out her loaves with quick dexterity and putting them in the pans which stood ready; "but I aint a fool. I can tell you one thing. Mis' Busby aint a fool neither; and when she pays anybody to go from New York here in the cars, it aint to pick her a bunch o' flowers and go back again."
Rotha was not a fool either, and was of the same opinion. This brought her back to her business.
"If I stay a while, I shall want to get at some books to read," she said."Are there any in the house?"
"Books?" said Mrs. Purcell. "I've never seen no books since I've been here."
"Where can I get some, then? Where are there any?"
"I don't know nothin' about books. I don't have no use for no books, my own self. I don't read none—'cept my 'little blue John.'"
"Your 'little blue John'? What is that?"
"I s'pose you have a big one."
"I do not know what you mean."
"I don't mean nothin'," said the woman impatiently. "There's my 'little blue John'—up on the mantel shelf; you can look at it if you want to."
Looking to the high shelf above the kitchen fireplace, Rotha saw a little book lying there. Taking it down, she was greatly astonished to find it a copy of the gospel of John, a little square copy, in limp covers, very much read. More surprised Rotha could hardly have been.
"Why, do you like this?" she involuntarily exclaimed.
"Sometimes I think I do,"—was Mrs. Purcell's ambiguous, or ironical, answer; as she carefully spread neat cloths over her pans of bread. Rotha wondered at the woman. She was handsome, she had a good figure and presence; but there was a curious mixture of defiance and recklessness in her expression and manner.
"I see you have read it a good deal."
"It's easy readin',"—was the short answer.
"Do you like the gospel of John so much better than all the rest of theBible?"
"I don' know. The rest has too many words I can't make out."
"Well, I am very fond of the gospel of John too," said Rotha. "I think everybody is,—that loves Christ."
"Do you love him?" Mrs. Purcell asked quickly and with a keen look.
"Yes, indeed. Do you?"
Mrs. Purcell laughed a little laugh, which Rotha could not understand. "I aint one o' the good folks"—she said.
"But you might love him, still," said Rotha, drawn on to continue the conversation, she hardly knew why, for she certainly believed the woman's last assertion.
"The folks that love him are good folks, aint they?"
"They ought to be," said Rotha slowly.
"Well, that's what I think. There's folks thatsaythey love him, and I can't see as they're no better for it.Ican't."
"Perhaps they are trying to be better."
"Do you think Mis' Busby is?"
The question came with such sharp quickness that Rotha was at a loss how to answer.
"She says she do. I aint one o' the good folks; and sometimes I tells JoeI'm glad I aint."
"But Mrs. Purcell, that is not the way to look at it. I have seen other people that said they loved Christ, and they lived as if they did. They were beautiful people!"
Rotha spoke with emphasis, and Mrs. Purcell gave her one of her sideway glances. "I never see no such folks," she returned cynically.
"I am very glad I have," said Rotha; "and I know religion is a blessed, beautiful truth. I have seen people that loved Jesus, and were a little bit like him in loving other people; they did not live for themselves; they were always taking care of somebody, or teaching or helping somebody; making people happy that had been miserable; and giving, everywhere they could, pleasure and comfort and goodness. I have seen such people."
"Where did they live?"
"In New York."
"Was they in Mis' Busby's house?"
"Not those I was speaking of."
"When I see folks like that, I'll be good too," was Mrs. Purcell's conclusion.
"But you love this little book?" said Rotha, recurring to the thumb-worn little volume in her hand.
"I didn't tell you I did."
"No, but I see you do. I should think, anybody that liked the gospel ofJohn, would want to be like what it says."
"I didn't tell you I didn't."
"No," said Rotha, half laughing. "I am only guessing, and wishing, you see. Mrs. Purcell, will you take some water up to my room?"
The woman's brows darkened. "What for?" she asked.
"To wash with. The water I took up this afternoon was for putting my room in order,—basin and pitcher and washstand, and wiping off dust. I want water, you know, every day for myself."
"The water's down here—just out o' that door."
"But I cannot wash down here."
"I don't know nothin' about that, whether you can or whether you can't. That's where us washes. If you want to do it up stairs, there's nothin' to hinder you."
"Except that somebody must carry up the water."
"That's notmybusiness," said the woman. "You can take that pail if you want to; but you must bring it down again. That's my pail for goin' to the pump."
Rotha hesitated. Must she come to this? And to doingeverythingfor herself and for her own room? For if carrying up the water, then surely all other services beside. Providing water was one of the least. Was it come to this? She must know.
"Then you will not take care of my room for me, Mrs. Purcell?" she asked quietly.
"Mis' Busby didn't write nothin' about my takin' care o' rooms," saidMrs. Purcell; "without they was empty ones. I've got you to take care of;I can't take o' your room too. You're strong and well, aint you, likeother folks?"
Rotha made no reply. She stood still, silent and indignant, both at the impertinence of the woman's speech and at the hardness of her aunt's unkindness. The shadow of the prospect before her fell upon her very gloomily and chill. Mrs. Purcell it was safest not to answer. Rotha turned, took up the pail and went to the pump.
And there she stood still She set down her pail, but instead of pumping the water, she laid hold of the pump handle and leaned upon it What ever was to become of her? Must she be degraded not only to menial companionship but to manual labour also? Once no doubt Rotha had been familiar with such service; but that was when she was a child; and the years that had passed since then and the atmosphere of Mrs. Mowbray's house had ripened in her a love of refinement that was almost fastidious. Not only of innate refinement, which she knew would not be affected, but of refinement in all outward things; her hands, her carriage, her walk, her dress. Must she live now to do things which would harden her hands, soil her dress, bend her straight figure, and make her light step heavy? For how long? If she had known it would be only for a month, Rotha would have laughed at it, and played with it; instead of any such comforting assurance, she had a foreboding that she was to be left in Tan field for an indefinite length of time. She tried to reason herself out of this, saying to herself that she had really no ground for it; in vain. The sure instinct, keener than reason in taking evidence, forbade her. She stood in a sort of apathy of dismay, looking into the surrounding shrubbery and noting things without heeding them; feeling the sweet, still spring air, the burst of fresh life and the opening of fresh promise in earth and sky; hearing the birds twitter, the cocks crowing, and noticing that there was little else to even characterize, much less break, the silent peace of nature. In the midst of all this what she felt was revulsion from her present surroundings and companionship; and it was at last more to get out of Mrs. Purcell's near neighbourhood than for any other reason that she filled her pail and carried it up stairs to her room. She was half glad now that it was so far away from the kitchen. If she could but take her meals up there! She filled her pitchers; but did not immediately go back with Mrs. Purcell's pail. She sat down at the window instead, and crossing her arms on the sill, sat looking out, questioning the May why she was there?
Oddly enough, it seemed as if the May answered her after a while. The beauty, the perfectness, the loveliness, the peace, held perhaps somewhat the same sort of argument with her as was addressed by the Lord himself, once upon a time, to his servant Job. Here there was no audible voice; yet I think it is still the same blessed Speaker that speaks through his works, and partly the same, or similar, things that he says. Could there be such order, such beauty, such plain adaptation, regularity and system, in one part of the works and government of God, and not in another. And after all it was He who had sent Rotha to this place and involved her in such conditions. Then surely for some reason. As the gentleness of the spring air is unto the breaking of winter's bands, and the rising of the sap is unto the swelling of the buds and by and by the bursting leaf, must it not be so surely a definite purpose with which she had been brought here? What purpose? Were there bands to be broken in her soul's life? were buds and leafage and flower to be developed in her character, for which this severe weather was but a safe and necessary precursor? It might be; it must be; for it is written that "all things work together for good to them that love God." Rotha grew quieter, the voice of the spring was so sweet and came so clear—"Child, trust, trust! Nothing can go wrong in God's management." She heard it and she felt it; but Rotha was after all a young disciple and her experience was small, and things looked unpromising. Some tears came; however she was comforted and did trust, and resolved that she would try to lose none of the profiting she might anyway gain.
And, as she had now so few books to be busy with, might she not be meant to find one such great source of profiting in her Bible?
She drew it to her and opened her little "Treasury." What ever could she do now without that? It gave her a key, with which she could go unlocking door after door of riches, which else she would be at a loss to get at. She opened it at the eighth chapter of Romans and looked at the 28th verse.
"We know, that all things work together for good to them that love God—"
But things that come through people's wickedness?
She went on to the first reference. It was in the same chapter. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?"
Well, nothing, and nobody. And if so, that love standing fast, surely it was guaranty enough that no harm should come. Tears began to run, another sort of tears, hot and full, from Rotha's eyes. Shall a child of God have that love, and know he has it, and worry because he has not somewhat else? But this was not exactly to the point. She would look further.
What now? "We glory in tribulation," said the apostle; and he went on to say why; because the outcome of it, the right outcome, was to have the heart filled with the love of God, and so, satisfied. How that should be, Rotha studied. It appeared that trouble drove men to God; and that the consequence of looking to him was the finding out how true and how gracious he is; so fixing desire upon him, which desire, when earnest enough and simple enough, should have all it wanted. And cannot people have all this without trouble? thought Rotha. But she remembered how little she had sought God when her head had been full of lessons and studies and books and all the joys of life at Mrs. Mowbray's. She had not forgotten him certainly, but her life did not need him to fill any void; she was busied with other things. A little sorrowfully she turned to the next reference. Ge. 1. 20. Joseph's comforting words to the brothers who had once tried to ruin him.
"As for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good,—"
Rotha's heart made a leap. Yes, she knew Joseph's story, and what untoward circumstances they had been which had borne such very sweet fruit. Could it be, that in her own case things might work even so? Her aunt's evil intention do her no harm, but be a means of advantage? "All things shall work for good"—then, one way or the other way, but perhaps both ways. Yet she was quite unable to imaginehowgood could possibly accrue to her from all this stoppage of her studies, separation from her friends, seclusion from all the world at the top of an empty house, and banishment to the society of Joe Purcell and his wife. To be sure, things were as dark with Joseph when he was sold for a slave. Rotha's heart was a little lightened. The next passage brought the water to her eyes again. O how sweet it ran!
"Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments or no. And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know, that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live."—De. viii. 3, 4.
"Suffered thee to hunger." Poor Rotha! the tears ran warm from her eyes, mingled but honest tears, in which the sense ofherwilderness andherhunger was touched with genuine sorrow for her want of trust and her unwillingness to take up with the hidden manna. Yet she believed in it and prayed for it, and was very sure that when she once should come to live upon it, it would prove both sweet and satisfying. Ah, this was what she had guessed; there were changes to be wrought in herself, experiences to be attained, for the sake of which she had come to this place. Well! let the Lord dispose things as seemed to him best; she would not rebel. She would hope for the good coming. The next verse was one well known.
"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble."—Ps. xlvi. 1.
Yes, Rotha knew that. She went on, to Jeremiah's prophecy concerning a part of the captive Jews carried away to Babylon. And truly she seemed to herself in almost as bad a case.
"Thus saith the Lord, the God of Israel, Like these good figs, so will I acknowledge them that are carried away captive of Judah, whom I have sent out of this place into the land of the Chaldeans for their good. For I will set mine eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to their land; and I will build them, and not pull them down; and I will plant them, and not pluck them up. And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the Lord: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart."—Jer. xxiv. 5-7.
Rotha bowed her head upon her book. I am content! she said in herself. Let the Lord do even this with me, and take the way that is best. Only let me come out so!—
But the next wonderful words made her cry again. They cut so deep, even while they promised to heal so wholly.
"And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them; I will say, It is my people; and they shall say, The Lord is my God."—Zach. xiii. 9.
If Rotha's tears flowed, her heart did not give back from its decision. Yes, she repeated,—I would rather be the Lord's tried gold, even at such cost; at any cost. Must one go through the fire, before one can say and have a right to say, "The Lord is my God"? or does one never want to say it, thoroughly, until then? But to be the Lord's pure gold I cannot miss that. I wonder if Mrs. Mowbray has been through the fire? Oh I know she has. Mr. Southwode?—I think he must. I remember how very grave his face used to be sometimes.
Here Rotha's meditations were interrupted. She heard steps come clumping up the stairs, and there was a tap at her door.
"Prissy's got supper ready," said Mr. Purcell. "I've come up to call you."
With which utterance he turned about and went down the stairs again. Rotha gave a loving look at her Bible and "Treasury," locked her door, and followed him.
"It's quite a ways to the top o' the house," remarked Mr. Purcell. "It'd be wuss 'n a day's work to go up and down every meal."
"Nobody aint a goin' up and down every meal," said his wife. "Iaint, I can tell you."
"How am I to know, then, when meals are ready?" Rotha asked.
"I don' know," said Mr. Purcell; and his wife added nothing. Rotha began to consider what was her best mode of action.Thissort of experience, she felt, would be unendurable.
The table was set with coarse but clean cloth and crockery. I might say much the same of the viands. The bread however was very good, and even delicate. Besides bread and butter there was cold boiled pickled pork, cold potatoes, and a plate of raw onions cut up in vinegar. Mr. Purcell helped Rotha to the two first-named articles.
"Like inguns?"
"Onions? Yes, sometimes," said Rotha, "when they are cooked."
"These is rareripes. First rate—best thing on table. Better 'n if they was cooked. Try 'em?"
"No, thank you."
"I knowed she wouldn't, Joe," said Mrs. Purcell, setting down Rotha's cup of tea. "What us likes wouldn't suit the likes o' her. She's from the City o' Pride. Us is country folks, and don't know nothin'."
"I've a kind o' tender pity for the folks as don't know inguns," said Mr.Purcell. "It'sthemwhat don't know nothin'."
"She don't want your pity, neither," returned his wife. "I'd keep it, if I was you. Or you may pity her for havin' to eat along with we; it'sthatas goes hard."
"You are making it harder than necessary," said Rotha calmly, though her colour rose. "Please to let me and my likings or dislikings alone. There is no need to discuss them."
After which speech there was a dead, ominous silence, which prevailed during a large part of the meal. This could not be borne, Rotha felt. She broke the silence as Mrs. Purcell gave her her second cup of tea.
"I have been thinking over what you said about calling me to meals. I think the best way will be, not to call me."
"How'll you get down then?" inquired Mrs. Purcell sharply.
"I will come when I am ready."
"But I don't keep no table a standin'. 'Taint a hotel. If you'll eat when us eats, you can, as Joe and Mis' Busby will have it so; but if you aint here when us sits down, there won't be no other time. I can't stand waitin' on nobody."
"I was going to say," pursued Rotha, "that you can set by a plate for me with whatever you have, and I'll take it cold—if it is cold."
"Where'll you take it?"
"Wherever I please. I do not know."
"There aint no place but the kitchen."
Rotha was silent, trying to keep temper and patience.
"And when I've got my room cleaned up," Mrs. Purcell went on with increasing heat, "I aint a goin' to have nobody walkin' in to make a muss again. This room's my place, and Mis' Busby nor nobody else hasn't got no right in it. I aint a goin' to be nobody's servant, neither; and if folks from the City o' Pride comes visitin' we, they's got to do as us does. I never asked 'em, nor Joe neither."
"Hush, hush, Prissy!" said her husband soothingly.
"I didn't—and you didn't," returned his wife.
"But Mis' Busby has the house, and it aint as if it warn't her'n; and the young woman won't make you no trouble she can help."
"She won't make me none shecan'thelp," said Mrs. Purcell. "Us has to work, and I mean to work; but us has got work enough to do already, and I aint a goin' to take no more, for Mis' Busby nor nobody. You're just soft, Joe, and you let anybody talk you over. I aint."
"You've got a soft side to you, though," responded Joe, with a calm twinkle in his eye. "I'd have a rough time of it, if I hadn't foundthatout."
A laugh answered. The sudden change in the woman's lowering face astonished Rotha. Her brows unknit, the lines of irritation smoothed out, a genial, merry, amused expression went with her laugh over to her husband; and the talk flowed over into easier channels. Mr. Purcell even tried after his manner to be civil to the stranger; but Rotha's supper choked her; and as soon as she could she escaped from the table and the onions and went to her room again.
Evening was falling, but Rotha was not afraid any more. Her corner room under the roof seemed to her now one of the safest places in the world. Not undefended, nor unwatched, nor alone. She shut and locked her door, and felt that inside that door things were pleasant enough. Beyond it, however, the prospect had grown very sombre, and the girl was greatly disheartened. She sat down by the open window, and watched the light fade and the spring day finish its course. The air was balmier than ever, even warm; the lights were tender, the shadows soft; the hues in earth and sky delicate and varied and dainty exceedingly. And as the evening closed in and the shades grew deeper, there was but a change from one manner of loveliness to another; till the outlines of the tulip tree were dimly distinguishable, and the stars were blinking down upon her with that misty brightness which is all spring mists and vapours allow them. Yes, up here it was pleasant. But how in the world, Rotha questioned, was she to get along with the further conditions of her life here? And what would she become, she herself, in these coarse surroundings of companionship and labour? Either it will ruin me, or it will do me a great deal of good, thought she. If I do not lose all I have gained at Mrs. Mowbray's, and sink down into unrefined and hard ways of acting and feeling, it will be because I keep close to the Lord's hand and he makes me gentler and purer and humbler and sweeter by all these things. Can he? I suppose he can, and that he means to do it. I must take care I put no hindrance. I had better live in the study of the Bible.
Very, very sorrowful tears and drooping of heart accompanied these thoughts; for to Rotha's fancy she was an exile, for an indefinite time, from everything pleasant in the way of home or society. When at last she rose up and shut the window, meaning to strike a light and go on with her Bible study, she found that in the disagreeable excitement of the talk at supper she had forgotten to provide herself with lamp or candle. She could not go down in the dark through the empty house to fetch them now; and with a momentary shiver she reflected that she could not get them in the night if she wanted them. Then she remembered—"The darkness and the light are both alike to Thee." What matter, whether she had a lamp or not? The chariots of fire and horses of fire that made a guard round Elisha, were independent of all earthly help or illumination. Rotha grew quiet. As she could do nothing else, she undressed by the light of the stars and went to bed; and slept as sweetly as those who are watched by angels should, the long night through.
Spring had one of her variable humours, and the next day shewed a change. When Rotha awoke, the light was veiled and a soft rain was thickly falling. Shut up by the weather now! was the first thought. However, she got up, giving thanks for her sweet, guarded sleep, and made her toilet; then, seeing it depended on her alone to take care of her room, she put it carefully in order so far as was possible. It was early still, she was sure, though Rotha had no watch; neither voice nor stir was to be heard anywhere; and turning her back upon her stripped bed, the disorder of which annoyed her, she sat down to her Bible study. It is all I have got! thought she. I must make of it all I can.—May did not give her so much help this morning; the rain drops pattered thick and fast on leaf and window pane; the air was not cold, yet it was not genial either, and Rotha felt a chill creep over her. There was no way of having a fire up there, if she had wanted one. She opened her beloved books, to try and forget other things if she could. She would not go down stairs until it was certain that breakfast would be near ready.
Carrying on the line of study broken off yesterday, the first words to which she was directed were those in 2 Cor. iv. 17, 18.
"Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are unseen—"
Poor Rotha at this immediately rebelled. Nothing in the words was pleasant to her. She was wont always to live in the present, not in the future; and she would be willing to have the glory yonder less great, so it were not conditioned by the trouble here. And with her young life pulses, warm and vigorous as they were, to look away from the seen to the unseen things seemed well nigh impossible and altogether undesirable. It was comfort that she wanted, and not renunciation. She was missing her friends and her home and her pursuits; she was in barren exile, amid a social desert; a captive in bonds that though not of iron were still, to her, nearly as strong. She wanted deliverance and gladness; or at least, manna; not to look away from all and find her solace in a distant vision of better things.
I suppose it is because I have so little acquaintance with things unseen, thought Rotha in dismal candidness. And after getting thoroughly chilled in spirit, she turned her pages for something else. The next passages referred to concerned the blessedness of being with Christ, and the rest he gives after earth's turmoil is over. It was not over yet for Rotha, and she did not wish it to be over; life was sweet, even up here in her room under the roof. How soft was the rain-drop patter on the outer world! how beautiful the glitter of the rain-varnished leaves! how lovely the tints and hues in the shady depths of the great tulip tree! how cheery the bird song which was going on in spite of everything! Or perhaps the birds found no fault with the rain. I want to be like that, said Rotha to herself; not to be out of the storm, but to be able to sing through it. And that is what people are meant to do, I think.
The words in the twelfth of Hebrews were some help to her; verses 10 and 11 especially; confessing that for the time being, trouble was trouble, yet a bitter root out of which sweet fruit might grow; in "them which are exercised thereby."
"Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees."—
Courage, hope, energy, activity; forbidding to despond or to be idle; the words did her good. She lingered over them, praying for the good fruits to grow, and forming plans for her "lifted-up" hands to take hold of. And then the first verses of the first chapter of James fairly laid a plaister on the wounds of her heart. "Count it all joy." "The trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing."
Rotha almost smiled at the page which so seemed to smile at her; and took her lesson then and there. Patience. Quiet on-waiting on God. That was her part; the good issues and the good fruit he would take care of. Only patience! Yes, to be anything but patient would shew direct want of faith in him and want of trust in his promise. And then the words in 1 Peter i. 6, 7, gave the blessed outcome of faith that has stood the trial; and finally came the declaration—
"As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten; be zealous therefore, and repent."
Rotha fell on her knees and prayed earnestly for help to act in accordance with all these words. As she rose from her knees, the thought crossed her, that already she could see some of the good working of her troubles; they were driving her to God and his word; and whatever did that must be a blessing.
She ran down stairs, quite ready now for her breakfast. Entering the kitchen, she stood still in uncertainty. No table set, no cooking going on, the place in perfect order, and Mrs. Purcell picking over beans at the end of the table. The end of the table was filled with a great heap of the beans, and as she looked them over Mrs. Purcell swept them into a tin pan in her lap. She did not pause or look up. Rotha hesitated a moment.
"Good morning!" she said then. "Am I late?"
"I don' know what folks in the City o' Pride calls early. 'Thout knowing that, I couldn't say."
"But is breakfast over?"
"Joe and me, us has had our breakfast two hours ago."
"I did not know it was so late! I had no notion what o'clock it was."
"Joe said, he guessed you was sleepin' over. That's what he said."
"Well, have you kept any breakfast for me, Mrs. Purcell?"
"I didn't set by nothin' in particular. I didn't know as you'd be down 'fore dinner. You didn't say."
Rotha waited a minute, to let patience have a chance to get her footing; she seemed to be tottering. Then she said, and she said it quietly,
"Where can I get something to eat?"
"I don' know," said the woman indifferently.
"But I must have some breakfast," said Rotha.
"Must you? Well, I don' know how you'll get it.Myhands is full."
"You must give it to me," said Rotha firmly. "I will take it cold, or any way you please; but I must have something."
Mrs. Purcell sat silent at her bean picking, and there was a look of defiance on her handsome face which nearly put Rotha's patience to a shameful rout. She hardly knew how to go on; and was extremely glad to see Mr. Purcell come in from the lower kitchen.
"Wet mornin'!" said Mr. Purcell, with a little jerk of his head which did duty for a salutation.
"Mr. Purcell," said Rotha, "I am glad you are come; there is a question to be decided here."
"No there aint; it's decided," put in Mr. Purcell's wife. The man looked as if he would like to be left out of the question; but with a resigned air he asked, "What is it?"
"Whether, while I am in this house, I can have my proper meals, and have them properly."
"You can have your meals, if you'll come to 'em," said Mrs. Purcell, picking her beans.
Rotha was too vexed to speak again, and looked to the man.
"Well—you see," he began conciliatingly, as much towards his wife as towards her, Rotha thought, "you see, Prissy has her work, and she has a lot of it; and she likes to do it reg'lar. It kind o' puts her out, you see, to be gettin' breakfast all along the mornin'. Now she's gettin' her dinner. She's like a spider;—let her alone, and put nothin' in her way, and she'll spin as pretty a web as you'll see; but if you tangle it up, it'll never get straight again."
Mrs. Purcell kept diligently picking her beans over and sweeping them into her pan.
"You do not meet the question yet," said Rotha haughtily.
"Well, you see, the best way would be for you to be along at meal times; when they's hot and ready on the table. Then one more wouldn't make so much difference."
"I have no way of knowing when the meals are ready. If Mrs. Purcell will set by some for me on a plate, and a cup of coffee, I will take it, not good nor hot."
"My victuals aint bad when they's cold," put in Mrs. Purcell here.
"Well, Prissy, can't you do that?" asked her husband.
"You can do it if you like," she said, getting up at last from the table, whence the great heap of beans had disappeared. "It ain't nothin' to me what you do."
Mr. Purcell demanded no more of a concession from his housekeeper, but went forthwith to one cupboard after another and fetched forth a plate and cup and saucer, knife and fork and spoon, and finally bread, a platter with cold fried pork on it, and some butter. He had not washed his hands before shewing this civility; and Rotha looked on in doubtful disgust.
"Where's the coffee, Prissy?"
"The last of it went down your throat. You never leaves a drop in the coffee pot, and wouldn't if there was a half a gallon. What's the use o' askin' me, when you know that?"
"Can I have a glass of milk?" said Rotha.
The milk was furnished, and she began to make a very good breakfast on bread and milk.
"Aint there a bit o' pie, Prissy?" asked Mr. Purcell.
"You've swallowed it. There aint no chance for nothin' when you're round."
Upon which Mr. Purcell laughed and went out, glad no doubt to have the matter of breakfast disposed of without any more trouble. But Rotha eat slowly and thoughtfully. Breakfast was disposed of, but not dinner. How was she to go on? She meditated, tried to gather patience, and at last spoke.
"It is best to arrange this thing," she said. "Meals come three times a day. If you will call me, Mrs. Purcell, I will come. If you will not do that, will you set by things for me?"
"Things settin' round draws the flies. We'd be so thick with flies, we couldn't see to eat."
"What way will you take, then?"
"Idon' know!"
All the while she was actively and deftly busy; putting her beans in water, preparing her table, and now sifting flour. Rotha came and stood at one end of the table.
"I should not have thought," she said, "that anybody that loved the gospel of John, would treat me so."
A metallic laugh answered her, which she could not help thinking covered some feeling. The woman's words however were uncompromising.
"I didn't say I loved no gospel of John."
"No, not in words; but the little book tells of itself that somebody has loved it."
"I'll put it away, where it won't tell nothin'."
"My aunt pays you for my board," Rotha went on, "and she expects that you will make me comfortable."
"Whatdoes she pay for your board?" said Mrs. Purcell, lifting up her head and flashing her black eyes at Rotha.
"I do not know what. I did not read her letter. You must know."
"She don't pay nothin' for you!" said the woman scornfully. "That's Mis' Busby!She'sa good Christian, and that's the way she does. She'll go to church, and say her prayers regular, and be a very holy woman; but she won't pay nobody nothin' if she can help it; and she thinks us'll do it, sooner 'n lose the place, and she can put you off on us for nothin'—don't ye see? So much savin' to her, and she can put the money in the collection. I don't believe in bein' no Christian! Us wouldn't do the like o' that, and us aint no Christians; and I like our kind better 'n her kind."
Rotha stood petrified.
"You must be mistaken," she said at length. "My aunt may not have mentioned it, but it is of course that she pays you for your time and trouble, as well as for what I cost you."
"You don't costhernothin'," said Mrs. Purcell. "That's all she cares for. Us knows Mis' Busby. Maybe you don't."
The last words were scornful. Rotha hardly heeded them, the facts of the case had cut her so deep. "Can it be possible!" she exclaimed in a stupefied way. Mrs. Purcell glanced at her.
"You didn't know?"
"Certainly not. Nothing would have made me come, if I had. Nothing would have made me! But I am dependent on my aunt. I have no money of my own." Two bitter tears made their way into Rotha's eyes. "Of course you do not want to take trouble for me," she went on. "I cannot much blame you."
"Me and Joe has to live and get along, as 'tis; and it takes a sight o' work to take care o' Joe. 'Taint feedin' no chicken, to feed Joe Purcell; and Prissy Purcell has a good appetite her own self; and Joe, he won't eat no bread as soon as it's beginnin' to get dry; an' I has to bake bread all along the week. An' Joe, he's always gettin' into the bushes and tearin' his things, and he won't go with no holes in 'em; and nights I has to sit up and put patches. I put patches with my eyes shut, 'cause I's so sleepy I can't hold 'em open. An' he wears the greatest sight o' clothes of any man in Tanfield. He wears three shirts; there's his red flannel one, and one o' unbleached muslin—you know that is warm, next his skin; 'cause he won't have the flannel next his skin; and then there goes a white shirt over all; and the cuffs and the collar must be starched and stiff and shiny, or he aint satisfied. I tells him it aint no use; it won't stay so over five minutes; but anyhow, he is satisfied."
"I shouldn't think it was wholesome to wear so many clothes," said Rotha.
"He thinks 'tis."
"You should coax him out of it."
"Prissy Purcell has tried that, and she won't try it no more. There aint no coaxin' Joe. If he wants to do a thing, he'll do it his own self; and if he don't want to do it, you can't move him."
Rotha paused a minute, to let the subject of Joe Puree 11 drop.
"Well, Mrs. Purcell," she said then, "I am very sorry I am on your hands. I do not know exactly what to do. I will write to my aunt, and tell her how I am situated, and howyouare situated; but till her answer comes, how shall we do?"
"She won't send no answer!" said Mrs. Purcell, in a much modified manner however. "Us knows her, Joe and me. She's got what she wants, and she's satisfied. She don't care for my trouble, nor for your trouble. She's great on savin', Mis' Busby is. She don't never pay nothin' she hadn't need to."
"I am very sorry," said Rotha bitterly. "I will see if I can find some way of earning the money, Mrs. Purcell, so that I can pay you for the cost and trouble I put you to. But I must have time for that; and meanwhile, what will you do?"
"Us wouldn't think so much of it," Mrs. Purcell went on, "if she didn't set up for bein' somethin' o' extras. I don't make no count o' no such Christians. Mis' Busby wouldn't miss the Communion!—" And the speaker looked up at Rotha, as if to see what she thought on the subject.
"There are different sorts of Christians," said Rotha. "Meanwhile, how shall we arrange things, Mrs. Purcell?"
"Will all sorts of Christians get to heaven," was Mrs. Purcell's response, the query put with her sharp black eyes as well as with her lips.
"Why no! Of course not. Christians are not all alike; but it is only trueChristians whom the Lord will call his own."
"How aint they alike? how is they different?"
"Real Christians? Well—some of them are ignorant, and some are wise. Some have had good teachings and good helpers, and some have had none; it makes a difference."
"I thought they was all one."
"So they are, in the main things. They all love Christ, and trust in his blood, and do his will. So far as they know it, at least. 'Whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.' So Jesus said, when he was upon earth."
Mrs. Purcell stopped in what she was doing and looked up at Rotha. "That aint in my 'little blue John,'" she said.
"No, I think the words are in Matthew."
"And aint no other people Christians, but them as is like that?"
"You know what is written in the fourteenth chapter of John—'He that hath my commandments andkeepeth them, he it is that loveth me.'"
"And aint there no other sort?" inquired Mrs. Purcell, still peering intoRotha's eyes.
"Of Christians? Certainly not. Not of real Christians. How could there be?"
"Then I don't believe there aint none."
"O yes, there are! Many, many. True believers and servants of the LordJesus."
"Then Prissy Purcell never see one of 'em," said the woman decidedly.
It shot through Rotha's mind, how careful she must be. This woman's whole faith in Christianity might depend on how she behaved herself. She stood soberly thinking, and then came back to the immediate matter in hand.
"I will pay you, Mrs. Purcell, for my cost and trouble, if ever I can," she said. "That is all I can say. I would go away, if I could. I do not want to be here."
"It's hard on you, that's a fact," said the woman. "Well, us won't make it no harder, Joe and me. We aint starvin'. Joe, he's money laid up; and us always has victuals to eat; victuals enough; and good, what they is, for Joe won't have nothin' else. I don' know if you can like 'em. But I can't go up all them stairs."
"I will take care of my own room. Cannot you call me when dinner is ready, in some way?"
"Joe can holler at you. He can go out and holler."
"I'll have my window open, and I shall hear. And some day, Mrs. Purcell,I will pay you."