But this particular morning there was no enthusiasm left. My brain was dull, my tongue stumbled and tripped over the most familiar lines, I could not control my thoughts. Haze had a cough, and nothing but a sweet potato sandwich for luncheon,—the struggle was too unfair, too hopeless!—till, actually, I caught myself weeping into the washtub, bedewing the family linen with splashing tears.
Certainly, things did look black. It was over a month since the Hancocks had left us, nearly two since we bade farewell to Mrs. Hudson. Even mother was beginning to show the strain. She looked worn and worried. As for me, I was tired of the dish-washing, the sweeping, the dusting; everything to be done afresh each day. I had not touched my mandolin for weeks. My hands, then puffed and scarlet, would be stiff and cracked on the morrow. I held them up and looked at them.
Which brought the thought of Meta, and the old inevitable contrast. That very evening she was going to a party;—a pretty, informal affair, consisting of charades, a supper, and a dance. How care-free her life was! How happily exempt from sordid considerations! She was surrounded by attention, gayety, admiration,—I would love such things, too!
A great fat tear rolled off the tip of my nose, and splashed down on Robin’s little striped pajamas.
“Come, come,” I told myself. “This is ridiculous! Cheer up, child, and repeat Horatius, if you can’t remember any French.”
But even Macaulay’s stirring lines, with which Haze and I have heartened each other since nursery days, seemed to have lost their magic.
“Lars Porsena of Clusium,——”
I began; and ended on a sob. Till, quite unexpectedly, without the least premeditation, I found myself murmuring instead:—
“O Lord, raise up, we pray Thee, Thy power, and come among us, and with great might succour us; that whereas, through our sins and wickedness, we are sore let and hindered in running the race that is set before us, Thy bountiful grace and mercy may speedily help and deliver us;...”
It was the beautiful collect for the Fourth Sunday in Advent. There seemed nothing incongruous in repeating it above a washtub, either! Instantly I dried my tears. “Whereas, through our sins and wickedness, we are sore let and hindered in running the race that is set before us!” That was the whole trouble! Parties, indeed! attention! What did they matter to a girl blessed with the dearest family in the world to love and work for? My back stopped aching. I thought of little patient Robin upstairs in the big rocker, “pertending” to play with his “friends,”—how his pale cheeks would flush with pleasure if I could manage to hang out the clothes in time to sit with him a few moments before lunch. It was worth trying for! And so I did;—and it was that very morning, if you please, that Bobsie, looking down the street, uttered his jubilant shout:—