Katie Robertson

by Margaret E. Winslow

CHAPTER XXV.

OUT INTO THE WORLD.

"So you wouldn't like to be my little girl and go to school and be educated for a lady," said Mr. Alfred Robertson to his niece, a few days after he had made his unexpected appearance among his relatives.

"I'd like to go to school and study, of course," said Katie. "Uncle, don't think me very rude or ungrateful, but I wish you would send Alfred."

"Why, rather than yourself?"

"Because Alfred is a boy, and he wants to be a doctor like father. He never told mother, because he thought it would make her feel badly. He knew she hadn't any money to send him to school or college, so he just worked on at the mill, though I know he hates it."

"But, little girl, it would cost a great deal of money to send a boy through college and support him while he was studying a profession. Have you thought of that?"

"I don't know, sir. I don't know much about money. You are not rich enough to do it then? I'm so sorry," and there was a tone of great disappointment in the young voice.

"I am rich enough perhaps, but"—

"Oh, sir! Alfred would be sure to pay it back as soon as he became a doctor. I could begin to pay you now. I make six dollars a week in the mill as it is, and I could make more if mother would let me work over hours. Alfred wouldn't like to take charity, and I wouldn't like to have him."

Her uncle laughed. "So it is because she is an independent little piece that she does not want to go to school and learn to be a lady," said he.

"I'd like very much to learn to be a teacher," said she. "Miss Eunice thinks that teachers can do a great deal of good, and I could make money to help mother with, just as well or better than I can in the mill."

"Well, you shall go to school on your own terms. You shall have the education anyway, and do what you like afterward. And since you are so very independent, I will lend you the money and you may pay it all back to me when you begin to make your fortune by school-teaching. Is it a bargain?"

The little girl blushed with delight, threw her arms around her kind uncle, giving him a kiss by way of thanks, and rushed off to tell her wonderful news to her mother. But she found it was not quite such news as she expected it to be. Mr. Robertson and his sister-in-law had talked it all over after the little folks were in bed, and he had definitely offered to give the two children the education which their mother had so greatly desired. He had amassed considerable property during his seventeen years' sojourn in California, and having no children of his own, was anxious to make up to those of his brother for his long neglect.

"I never thought anything about my duty toward them," he said, "until God brought me to myself, and showed me what a sinner I was, and then brought me to himself, and showed me what a Saviour he is. Then I began to remember all my neglected duties, and I determined to come home and atone for the past as soon as I could."

The proposal of sending Eric, also, to school had been made to him. But he gratefully declined. He was almost a man now, and was used to his work and liked it. He stood well with his employers, and hoped before many years to rise to the position of superintendent of one of the departments. His one great ambition was to become such a manufacturer as Mr. James. And in the meanwhile he would be at home to watch over his mother and contribute to her support. His uncle admired his pluck and independence, and did not press his offers farther upon him. Alfred was delighted. It was as Katie had said: he had endured the bindery because he must, and he was a boy of too good principles to worry over the inevitable, or to make people unhappy because of his likes or dislikes. But, all the same, he had disliked his work, and longed to do something more in accordance with his tastes. Only to Eric and Katie had he confided his indefinite longings, and his mother had never guessed how much he had desired a change. Now he was full of plans for the future; looking forward especially to the days when he should restore his father's sign to its old position, fit up the house and office as it used to be, and support his mother in ease and comfort once more.

But that was a long way off. A great deal of hard studying had to be done first, and Alfred was far behind other boys of his age—in book knowledge, at least. Perhaps he had, during his three years' experience in the factory, learned a good deal which would eventually prove very useful in a profession which dealt with practical details of practical things. About one thing he was quite decided. Delicate little Katie should never again work for her living. When she left school she should be a lady, like Miss Eunice and Miss Etta at the great house, and idle all day long if she chose to do so.

"But I don't choose," laughed Katie. "Do you think an independent young lady, who has made her own living for more than a year, will ever consent to be dependent upon any one, even if he is her brother? Besides, who wants to be idle? I am sure Miss Eunice isn't idle; nor Miss Etta, now. They are both as busy as they can be all the time; and Mr. James, too. Think how much good he does, and all of them!"

"Oh, if you mean that kind of work! Miss Eunice and Miss Etta don't get paid for what they do. They don't work for a living."

"I think they do," said Mr. Robertson, who had listened quietly to the talk of the children. "I think that every noble, honorable man and woman works, and is glad to work, for a living. The old saying that 'the world owes us a living' is a very fallacious one. The world doesn't owe us anything, and God does not either. Indeed, he has said: 'If any man will not work, neither shall he eat.'"

"Everybody does not work—for money, I mean," said Alfred. "Some people are gentlemen and ladies."

"If you call idlers gentlemen and ladies, we do not agree as to terms; but if you mean, as I suppose you do, that some people, especially a large proportion of women and girls, do not formally receive a definite amount of money for a definite amount of work, that is true. Don't you think, though, that mothers and sisters and wives, who keep house, take care of little children, do all the family sewing, care for the sick, and attend to the many details of a woman's life, work?—yes, do a great deal of work for a very small amount of living? Think of your mother for a moment."

"Yes, sir; I see."

"And," continued his uncle, "when ladies devote themselves faithfully to good works, Sunday-school work, work among the poor, teaching, etc., they are as really working for their living as if they were in a factory."

"It doesn't seem so."

"No, it doesn't seem so, because we have wrong ideas about the nobility of labor. If we really believed what the Bible says,—that the servant of all is the chiefest of all,—we should value work and workmen just in proportion to the use which the work they do is to the community and the world. In that sense, Alfred, a doctor's work or a minister's work might stand a little higher than a manufacturer's, a teacher's position be more desirable than that of a factory-girl, because in all of these professions there is more opportunity to do good to the bodies and souls of men; and yet I doubt if any are in a position to do more good than your Mr. James Mountjoy and his family. And as to being gentlemen or ladies, it is just as much your duty and just as possible to be those in the rag-room as in a palace, should your lot be cast there."

"It is not considered so genteel," said Tessa, who had not quite forgotten the teachings of her novels.

"By whom? Foolish butterflies? or men and women of sense? Gentility meant, originally, gentleness: that gentleness which better opportunities of education were supposed to give. But so much culture as that is now within the reach of every one, and there is no reason why it should not exist in the mill and the counting-room, the kitchen and the store, as well as in the parlor and the library."

"But after all," said Mrs. Robertson, "there seems something low and sordid in working for money."

"That is because we should not work for money—as the motive of work, I mean. If every one in the world were a Christian, and did the work which came to him to do, upon Bible principles, endeavoring to fulfil the precept: 'Whether ye eat or drink or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God,' and accepted his living, small or great, from his hands, just as a little child accepts his from his father's hands, we should hear nothing about the degradation of service. Every one would constantly say: 'Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?' And we should take our daily bread, as well as all the pleasant things of our lives, thankfully from him who has given us all things to enjoy."

Mr. Robertson was rather answering his sister and talking a little above the level of his auditors, but some of them understood and remembered his words. To Katie, henceforth work had an added dignity. It was raised even above the high level upon which she had thus far placed it,—that of helping her mother,—and became something that she might do for Jesus who had done, and was still doing, so much for her. She was quite impatient to enter upon those studies which were to fit her for future usefulness, and many a time during her school life, when the novelty had worn away and her energies might have flagged, she was stirred up to new zeal and perseverance by the recollection of this conversation.

To the other girls also this talk about work and compensation was beneficial. Perhaps they might have felt a little jealous at Katie's apparent elevation above themselves,—even Christian girls have wrong feelings sometimes,—but if factory-work could really be done to the glory of God as much as teaching could, there was nothing degrading in their work, nothing aristocratic in Katie's. God had given her one kind of work to do, and them another—that was all. They could please him as well as she; and he would give to all alike a great deal more than they deserved.

And now began a busy time in the doctor's old house. Brother and sister must be fitted out for school with such wardrobes as they had never possessed in their lives before. Uncle Alfred's ready purse provided these, but he was careful not to destroy the independent spirit of his young relatives, and let them consider this as the first instalment of his loan.

Katie left the factory at the close of the week, receiving with her usual weekly wages an extra five-dollar bill, as a testimonial from Mr. James for her uniform faithfulness and the good example she had always set in the mill.

"We are sorry to lose you, Katie," he said, "but I am glad that you are to be advanced to better work and a wider sphere of usefulness. Wherever you go, the prayers of Squantown Sunday-school will go with you, and I am sure that you will always find, as you have done already, the truth of the words:—

"'Commit thy way unto the Lord, and he shall bring it to pass.'"

Nor did the pleasant incidents stop here. On the Wednesday following, Miss Eunice again invited all the girls of her sister's class to unite with those of her own. There was no lesson that night, and very little work done. All the brothers and friends, who usually acted as escorts, were invited to come to tea, and all the members of the "Do Good Society." There was room for all, and all had "a splendid time." Games were played, and songs sung, and everybody was made to understand that this was a farewell party in honor of Katie Robertson.

At nine o'clock Mr. Morven came in, and, with a few pleasant and earnest words, presented the little girl with a beautifully bound Bible, to the purchase of which every one present had contributed a little.

"I trust," said he, "that our little Katie will make this book 'the man of her counsel, and the guide of her youth,' in the new life upon which she is entering, and that, as the Saviour to whom she has consecrated herself will surely keep his promise 'never to leave or forsake her,' she will be faithful 'in all her ways to acknowledge him,' and grow in grace as she does in knowledge."

Then, calling his little congregation to join with him, the good pastor prayed that the dear Lord would guide and guard this lamb of his through "all the chances and changes of this mortal life, and finally bring her to his heavenly kingdom."

And so, with loving kisses, and gifts, and solemn words of prayer, they sent Katie Robertson out into the world to meet its responsibilities.

The next morning, in the early dawn, she and her brother set out with their uncle for the schools in which they were to be fitted for their life-work. And as these schools were a long way off, and the journey thither rather expensive, it was many months before Squantown saw them again.