Left to Ourselves Part 8

Agnes glanced up, and reminded Minnie of her own work; but she was too busy in conjecturing what Hugh was about to heed.

He laid the piece out on the table, folded it in half, and proceeded to thread himself a needle.

"Are you going to _work_, Hugh?" asked the never-satisfied little maiden.

Hugh nodded, nowise disconcerted at her surprised tone, and soon he had begun to sew up the sides, clumsily enough perhaps, but still effectually.

Minnie found work was to be "the order of the day," so she relapsed into silence.

After an hour's close application, during which time Minnie had watched with curious eyes John's hand diving in and out of the rag-bag, Hugh p.r.o.nounced his contribution done, and went over to his brother and asked him if his were ready. A whispered consultation ensued behind the cardboard box, and then there was some mysterious pushing and manoeuvring, which raised Minnie's expectation to the last extent. Her brothers, however, enjoyed keeping up the joke, and there was a fine laugh when they laid a neatly-finished cushion on the table in front of the inquisitive little girl.

"What is in it?" she asked, pinching and pulling it about.

"Only mother's woollen rags snipped up in tiny pieces," said Hugh.

"You should not have told her," remarked John; "but I say, don't my fingers ache! and isn't there a blister on my thumb?"

"Did you cut all that to-day?"

"No, we have been at the snipping business all the week, off and on, and I declare old Mrs. Hales will not have a bad pillow after all."

"Where is Alice?" said Hugh.

"She is doing her part," answered Mrs. Headley; "this is a busy time for cook, and Alice is helping her to make the puddings."

"When shall we go round, Agnes?" asked Minnie.

"On Christmas Eve, mother thinks."

"I wish it were here, then."

"I do not, for we must finish all this heap of mending first."

"You'll tell us who you give it to, Agnes, and all about your visits,"

said John, who loved a story as much as anyone. "It will make us 'good boys' when they are gone."

"Oh, yes," answered Agnes.

"Then we will wait patiently till then; and if you can think of anything we can help in, we are ready, mother, now it is holiday time."

"I will consider it," she answered, "but while we plan to do something for those in need, let us remember, my dears, one thing."

The faces were turned affectionately towards the mother, who so anxiously watched over her children, while she said gently, "It is not _only_ that we are to 'visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction,' but we are 'to keep ourselves unspotted from the world.'"

"That's almost harder than the other," said Hugh thoughtfully.

"Except by 'looking off unto Jesus,'" said Mrs. Headley; "'I can do all things, through Christ which strengtheneth me.'"

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER VIII.

_ONE INJUNCTION._

"I cannot leave you a great number of injunctions," exclaimed Mrs.

Headley tearfully, on that last morning when all was ready for departure, and the day for the sailing of the steamer had really come.

"I think you have, mother," said Hugh, trying to hide his feeling under a joke.

"No, not to you, dear; to Agnes I may have."

"Yes, to _me_" said Hugh. "I am to mind Agnes, and not to mind John; and to mind I am kind to Minnie; and to keep in mind that Alice is younger than I; and to----"

"Shut up," said John; "we don't want to hear your gabble to the last moment!"

"I was going to say," resumed their mother gently, "that there was one thing I did want you to think of."

"Tell us then, mother," said Alice, putting her arm round her fondly, "we'll keep it as the most important of all."

There was a momentary silence, and then Mrs. Headley turned to her husband with a mute appeal. "Tell them," she said brokenly, "what we were saying this morning."

"We want you all to think of one thing. In _any_ difficulty, in _every_ difficulty, in _all_ circ.u.mstances, say to yourselves, 'Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?' If you wait and hear the answer, it will help you in everything."

"People generally do wait to hear the answer to their question, don't they, father?" asked John.

"Not always; especially when they are speaking to G.o.d. But you be wiser, my children. In the waiting-time for the answer an extra blessing often comes."

The children looked thoughtful; and then their father took from a paper a large painted card in an oak frame, which he proceeded to hang up on a nail ready prepared for it.

On the card were letters in crimson and gold and blue, and the children read:

"Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?"

Then the sound of wheels suddenly reminded them that the parting had come. With a close embrace to each from their mother, and with an earnest "G.o.d bless you" to each from their father, the travellers turned to the door, followed by John and Hugh, who were to accompany them to the railway station.

When the last bit of the cab had disappeared. Agnes turned round to her younger sisters and put her arms round them both lovingly. "We'll be ever so happy together when we once get settled in," she said, choking down her own emotion, and bending down to kiss them in turn.

"Oh, yes," answered Alice with a sob, trying to look up bravely.

But Minnie could not look up. Her mother was her all, and her mother had gone. She threw herself into Agnes's arms in a pa.s.sion of misery.

Agnes sat down and tried to make her comfortable on her lap; but the child wailed and sobbed, and gave way to such violent grief that the elder sister was almost frightened, and looked towards the window with a momentary thought of whether it would be possible to recall her mother.