Ester Ried

by Pansy

CHAPTER II.

WHAT SADIE THOUGHT.

Sadie Ried was the merriest, most thoughtless young creature of sixteen years that ever brightened and bothered a home. Merry from morning until night, with scarcely ever a pause in her constant flow of fun; thoughtless, nearly always selfish too, as the constantly thoughtless always are. Not sullenly and crossly selfish by any means, only so used to think of self, so taught to consider herself utterly useless as regarded home, and home cares and duties, that she opened her bright brown eyes in wonder whenever she was called upon for help.

It was a very bright and very busy Saturday morning.

"Sadie!" Mrs. Ried called, "can't you come and wash up these baking dishes? Maggie is mopping, and Ester has her hands full with the cake."

"Yes, ma'am," said Sadie, appearing promptly from the dining-room, with Minnie perched triumphantly on her shoulder. "Here I am, at your service. Where are they?"

Ester glanced up. "I'd go and put on my white dress first, if I were you," she said significantly.

And Sadie looked down on her pink gingham, ruffled apron, shining cuffs, and laughed.

"O, I'll take off my cuffs, and put on this distressingly big apron of yours, which hangs behind the door; then I'll do."

"That's my clean apron; I don't wash dishes in it."

"O, bless your careful heart! I won't hurt it the least speck in the world. Will I, Birdie?"

And she proceeded to wrap her tiny self in the long, wide apron.

"Not that pan, child!" exclaimed her mother "That's a milk-pan."

"O," said Sadie, "I thought it was pretty shiny. My! what a great pan. Don't you come near me, Birdie, or you'll tumble in and drown yourself before I could fish you out with the dish-cloth. Where is that article? Ester, it needs a patch on it; there's a great hole in the middle, and it twists every way."

"Patch it, then," said Ester, dryly.

"Well, now I'm ready, here goes. Do you want these washed?" And she seized upon a stack of tins which stood on Ester's table.

"Do let things alone!" said Ester. "Those are my baking-tins, ready for use; now you've got them wet, and I shall have to go all over them again."

"How will you go, Ester? On foot? They look pretty greasy; you'll slip."

"I wish you would go up stairs. I'd rather wash dishes all the forenoon than have you in the way."

"Birdie," said Sadie gravely, "you and I musn't go near Auntie Essie again. She's a 'bowwow,' and I'm afraid she'll bite."

Mrs. Ried laughed. She had no idea how sharply Ester had been tried with petty vexations all that morning, nor how bitter those words sounded to her.

"Come, Sadie," she said; "what a silly child you are. Can't you do any thing soberly?"

"I should think I might, ma'am, when I have such a sober and solemn employment on hand as dish-washing. Does it require a great deal of gravity, mother? Here, Robin Redbreast, keep your beak out of my dish-pan."

Minnie, in the mean time, had been seated on the table, directly in front of the dish-pan.

Mrs. Ried looked around. "O Sadie! what possessed you to put her up there?"

"To keep her out of mischief, mother. She's Jack Horner's little sister, and would have had every plum in your pie down her throat, by this time, if she could have got to them. See here, pussy, if you don't keep your feet still, I'll tie them fast to the pan with this long towel, when you'll have to go around all the days of your life with a dish-pan clattering after you."

But Minnie was bent on a frolic. This time the tiny feet kicked a little too hard; and the pan being drawn too near the edge, in order to be out of her reach, lost its balance—over it went.

"O, my patience!" screamed Sadie, as the water splashed over her, even down to the white stockings and daintily slippered feet.

Minnie lifted up her voice, and added to the general uproar. Ester left the eggs she was beating, and picked up broken dishes. Mrs. Ried's voice arose above the din:

"Sadie, take Minnie and go up stairs. You're too full of play to be in the kitchen."

"Mother, I'm real sorry," said Sadie, shaking herself out of the great wet apron, laughing even then at the plight she was in.

"Pet, don't cry. We didn't drown after all."

"Well! Miss Sadie," Mr. Hammond said, as he met them in the hall. "What have you been up to now?"

"Why, Mr. Hammond, there's been another deluge; this time of dish-water, and Birdie and I are escaping for our lives."

"If there is one class of people in this world more disagreeable than all the rest, it is people who call themselves Christians."

This remark Mr. Harry Arnett made that same Saturday evening, as he stood on the piazza waiting for Mrs. Holland's letters. And he made it to Sadie Ried.

"Why, Harry!" she answered, in a shocked tone.

"It's a fact, Sadie. You just think a bit, and you'll see it is. They're no better nor pleasanter than other people, and all the while they think they're about right."

"What has put you into that state of mind, Harry?"

"O, some things which happened at the store to-day suggested this matter to me. Never mind that part. Isn't it so?"

"There's my mother," Sadie said thoughtfully. "She is good."

"Not because she's a Christian though; it's because she's your mother.
You'd have to look till you were gray to find a better mother than
I've got, and she isn't a Christian either."

"Well, I'm sure Mr. Hammond is a good man."

"Not a whit better or pleasanter than Mr. Holland, as far as I can see. I don't like him half so well. And Holland don't pretend to be any better than the rest of us."

"Well," said Sadie, gleefully, "I dont know many good people.
Miss Molton is a Christian, but I guess she is no better than Mrs.
Brookley, and she isn't. There's Ester; she's a member of the
church."

"And do you see as she gets on any better with her religion, than you do without it? For my part, I think you are considerably pleasanter to deal with."

Sadie laughed. "We're no more alike than a bee and a butterfly, or any other useless little thing," she said, brightly. "But you're very much mistaken if you think I'm the best. Mother would lie down in despair and die, and this house would come to naught at once, if it were not for Ester."

Mr. Arnett shrugged his shoulders. "I always liked butterflies better than bees," he said. "Bees sting."

"Harry," said Sadie, speaking more gravely, "I'm afraid you're almost an infidel."

"If I'm not, I can tell you one thing—it's not the fault of
Christians."

Mrs. Holland tossed her letters down to him from the piazza above, and
Mr. Arnett went away.

Florence Vane came over from the cottage across the way—came with slow, feeble steps, and sat down in the door beside her friend. Presently Ester came out to them:

"Sadie, can't you go to the office for me? I forgot to send this letter with the rest."

"Yes," said Sadie. "That is if you think you can go that little bit,
Florence."

"I shall think for her," Dr. Van Anden said, coming down the stairs. "Florence out here to-night, with the dew falling, and not even any thing to protect your head. I am surprised!"

"Oh, Doctor, do let me enjoy this soft air for a few minutes."

"Positively, no. Either come in the house, or go home directly. You are very imprudent. Miss Ester, I'll mail your letters for you."

"What does Dr. Van Anden want to act like a simpleton about Florence Vane for?" Ester asked this question late in the evening, when the sisters were alone in their room.

Sadie paused in her merry chatter. "Why, Ester, what do you mean? About her being out to-night? Why, you know, she ought to be very careful; and I'm afraid she isn't. The doctor told her father this morning he was afraid she would not live through the season, unless she was more careful."

"Fudge!" said Ester. "He thinks he is a wise man; he wants to make her out very sick, so that he may have the honor of helping her. I don't see as she looks any worse than she did a year ago."

Sadie turned slowly around toward her sister. "Ester, I don't know what is the matter with you to-night. You know that Florence Vane has the consumption, and you know that she is my dear friend."

Ester did not know what was the matter with herself, save that this had been the hardest day, from first to last, that she had ever known, and she was rasped until there was no good feeling left in her heart to touch. Little Minnie had given her the last hardening touch of the day, by exclaiming, as she was being hugged and kissed with eager, passionate kisses:

"Oh, Auntie Essie! You've cried tears on my white apron, and put out all the starch."

Ester set her down hastily, and went away.

Certainly Ester was cross and miserable. Dr. Van Anden was one of her thorns. He crossed her path quite often, either with close, searching words about self-control, or grave silence. She disliked him.

Sadie, as from her pillow she watched her sister in the moonlight kneel down hastily, and knew that she was repeating a few words of prayer, thought of Mr. Arnett's words spoken that evening, and, with her heart throbbing still under the sharp tones concerning Florence, sighed a little, and said within herself:

"I should not wonder if Harry were right." And Ester was so much asleep, that she did not know, at least did not realize, that she had dishonored her Master all that day.