She slowly relinquished it to him and stood at his elbow.
"That's a picture taken out of a book—not a portrait," he said.
"I picked it up. Some lodgers had gone away. I found it in a corner. Isn't it lovely? I'm sure she'd be just like that," reiterated Meg.
Mr. Standish was silent a moment. He was moved, yet he felt impelled to speak words of wisdom to the child. Mooning about corners of streets watching ladies drive past, and nursing those queer, foolish, ambitious ideas about her mother was not likely to lead to any good. He thought the whole story was probably without a grain of truth, the absurd fabrication of some old woman's brain, and likely to prove hurtful to Meg in giving her false notions concerning her duties in life.
He paused, revolving his words, anxious not to hurt, yet deeming it incumbent upon him to expel this foolish fancy.
"My dear child," he said at last, "why do you imagine your mother was like that picture, or like one of those ladies in the carriages? For all you know they may be lazy, vain, and selfish. It is not the pretty dress that makes the lady, or the face either. Is it not far better and more reasonable to think of that dear mother, whom you never saw, as one of God's own ladies? These ladies are found in all sorts of conditions, sometimes in caps and aprons, sometimes in beautiful bonnets, very often with brave, rough hands. What is wanted to make a lady is a kind, honest heart."
"No, that's not being a lady," interrupted the child, with a flash and a toss of her head. She spoke with decision; but her voice faltered as if she had received a shock. Taking the picture from the young man's hand, she began carefully, and with a trembling elaborateness, to replace it in its coverings. "Jessie's good, and so was Tilly. They work hard, and scrub, and run about on errands. They're not ladies. A lady's quite different," continued Meg, suddenly facing him and speaking with vehemence and clearness. "She's rich, and never scolds or cheats. She does not work at all—not a bit; people work for her and drive her about, but she does nothing herself. She has never dirty hands, or her cap all untidy, or looking all in a fuss. She does nothing but smile and look beautiful, like an angel," concluded Meg triumphantly, reiterating her favorite simile.
"Meg," said the young fellow, seeing more clearly the necessity to root out this absurd ideal from the child's mind, "you are talking very foolishly. A lady is, indeed, not necessarily an angel. You say a lady must be rich. Now, if your mother was rich, why are you poor? Would she not have left you her money in dying, and you would have been rich like her?"
"I don't know anything about that," said the child, growing a little pale, and beginning once more to fidget with the fashion-plate.