"It is the worst just now," I faltered.

"Very well, then, I will forgive you; but I must stipulate to see your pictures before they go to market after this, and also that you consult with me first before launching into other business enterprises. You might be tempted with something not quite so suitable for a young lady as picture-selling."

"You are so kind to me, Mr. Winthrop, I will tell you everything after this."

"No rash promises, please. Before the winter is over you will be plunged into tears and distress again over some fresh exploit."

"I won't mind a few tears if I get your forgiveness in the end."

He went directly to his study, leaving Mrs. Flaxman and myself to the cheerful quiet of our fireside. She turned to me saying,

"Tell me all about your blind friend, Medoline. How you first got to know him, and what he is like."

I very gladly gave her as full a picture as I was able of the Lark.u.ms and Mr. Bowen, their poverty and his goodness included.

"You have made all these discoveries in a few months, and been doing so much for them, and here have I been living beside them for years and did not even know of their existence. What makes the difference in us, Medoline?" she exclaimed sorrowfully.

"I think G.o.d must have planned my meeting in the train with Mrs. Blake. I would not have known but for her."

"I expect He plans many an opportunity for us to serve our generation, but we are too selfishly indolent to do the work he puts in our way."

"When I came to Oaklands at first it seemed as if my life was completed, and I wondered how I was to occupy the days, and years stretching out so long before me. Now I believe I could find work to occupy me for a thousand years; that is, if Mr. Winthrop lived too, and continued to help me with my reading and studies," I added, thinking how much the latter employment added to my enjoyment.

"If Mr. Bowen gets his eyesight, that will be a greatly added source of satisfaction to you," she said, wistfully.

"Yes, I shall seem to be looking at the green fields, and flowers, and starry skies through his eyes."

"You are as glad to have him so richly benefited through your means, as if he were rich and famous."

"Why, much more so. Think what a change there will be in his circ.u.mstances now."

"Medoline, I think your mother's prayers will be answered."

I turned around eagerly, "Was she a real Christian, Mrs. Flaxman?"

"Yes, a real one, especially after her children were born. Her great desire for them was that they might all be pure and unspotted from the world. All of them, save you, are with her in Heaven. You may have a life of peculiar temptation, but I believe you will be brought out of it among the pure in heart at last."

"Why should my life have peculiar temptations, Mrs. Flaxman?" I asked anxiously.

"I cannot explain to you now my reasons for thinking so. Some day I may tell you."

"I suppose it is because I am not like other girls of my age," I said with a sigh.

"No dear, that is not the reason. I should not have spoken so unguardedly."

"I might try to overcome the temptations if I were warned of their nature."

"You are a persevering child, Medoline--but still only a child in heart."

"I am over eighteen, Mrs. Flaxman. I wonder why you and Mr. Winthrop persist in making me out a child. When will I be a woman?"

"Not till your heart gets wakened."

"I wonder when that will be. Does it mean love and marriage, Mrs.

Flaxman?"

"It means the former; the latter may not follow with you."

"Why not? But there, I do not want to leave you and Mr. Winthrop and Oaklands. No man could tempt me from you. But what did you mean by saying that I might love and yet not marry?"

"Because you are too true to your woman's instincts to marry any one unless it was the man you loved."

I fell into a brown study over her words, and the conversation was not again resumed.

CHAPTER XVI.

HOPE REALIZED.

Mrs. Lark.u.m's recovery was slow, and it required all the nourishing food we could provide to start the springs of life working healthfully. Her mind had dwelt so long upon her bereavement, and dark outlook into the future that a naturally robust, and well-fed person might have succ.u.mbed, but when to a delicate organization had been added the most meagre fare possible to support human existence, it was no wonder nature rebelled.

It was a new experience to me, and a very agreeable one, to watch the pinched faces of the children grow round and rosy, and to hear their merry laughter.

The mother waited with feverish anxiety for tidings from her father, but for several weeks no word came; at last she began to fear he might have died under the strain of the operation. Mrs. Blake began to get anxious too, while there flitted before her fancy gruesome thoughts as to what might have been done to the poor body left to the care of those heartless doctors.

"I can't see why they take such delight in mangling dead people to see how they are put together. With all their trying they'll never be able to make a body themselves."

"It is in that way they have learned how to cure diseases and relieve pain," I a.s.sured her. "We ought to be grateful to them for taking so much trouble to relieve us of our miseries."

"I dare say we'd ought, I never thought of it that way before; in fact I've been rather sot ag'in doctors. Perhaps if they hadn't cut into dead folks' eyes, they couldn't have done for the likes of Mr. Bowen."

"a.s.suredly not; and sometimes the very greatest doctors bequeathe their own bodies to the dissecting room; especially if they die of some mysterious disease."

"That is good of them. I've always reckoned doctors a pretty tight lot, who worked for their money jest the same's the Mill hands."

"No doubt many of them do; but some of them are almost angelic in their sympathy for the suffering, and their longing to lessen it."

"I believe you can see more goodness in folks than any one I know. Now when I get cross with folks when they don't do as I think they ought, what you say comes to my mind; and before I know I get to making excuses, too. It's done me a sight of good being with you."

"And you have done me good,--taken me out of self, and taught me to think of others. I do not know how I should have been filling up my vacant hours but for you."

"I wish somebody would say that much to me," Mrs. Lark.u.m said, sorrowfully. "I don't think I am any use to any one."

"With these lovely children to care for, what more can you ask than to work for them?"

"Yes, I forget charity begins at home."