"You ought to like your father best."
Christina considered.
"Yes, I like him best, of course; but I couldn't tell him things that I could Miss Bertha. She always knows what you feel like inside, other people tell you what you ought to feel like, and I never feel what I ought."
"I never think of feelings at all," said Puggy a little scornfully; "that's just like a girl!"
Miss Bertha remained away a week. When she returned with Susy, Christina was hard at work, learning lessons with Miss Loder.
But the first day she was allowed, she went over to Miss Bertha; and Susy opened the door to her in a black frock and white apron.
"Oh, Miss Christina, I've been through such a time; oh dear, oh dear!"
And Susy began to cry.
Christina tried to comfort her, and then heard about her father's last illness.
"He were so good an' patient," said Susy, "an' so wonderful sorry for all 'e'd been an' done. He seemed to lie in bed an' think of all 'e'd done when he were in drink. He told me to teach of 'im to pray to God, an' I learned 'im what you learned me, how Jesus died on the Cross for his sins, and poor dad were just broken 'earted.