"We can't be fettered," said Mr. O'Flagherty gaily; "but on this scamp of mine rests the blame!"
Father and son drove off. Christina tired but happy climbed the nursery stairs, and confided to Miss Loder the history of her day. But she felt that her governess did not approve of Susy.
"She wasn't a dirty child," said Christina, in her defence. "And she is so clever. She drove her cart so carefully, and she loves her father so; and she says her mother told her to be good to him and keep him from drinking too much beer. And she doesn't mind if he beats her; she's the bravest girl I've ever heard of!"
Christina thought a great deal of Susy the next few days, and when she went to tea with Miss Bertha on Sunday afternoon she talked it all over with her. Taking tea with Miss Bertha had become an institution on Sunday. Miss Loder liked a rest from her small charge; Mrs. Maclahan was quite willing, and Miss Bertha used it as her opportunity to guide small footsteps heavenwards. Dawn and Puggy were often there too; but this Sunday Christina had Miss Bertha to herself, and she was not sorry; for her old problem was puzzling her, and she wanted Miss Bertha's sympathy and help.
"Miss Bertha, I keep thinking that I might have been born Susy!"
"Well, Childie, if you had?"
"I could never, never have done it!" Christina exclaimed, with tightly-clenched hands. "Fancy to-night if I knew my father was coming home to beat me! Oh, Miss Bertha, I should run away from him, I should be so frightened; and Susy loves him, and her arms are black and blue! He has hit her with a poker, and his whip, and even thrown his tin kettle at her. Why, Miss Bertha, she's braver than Joan of Arc! And supposing I had been born her, what should I do!"
A little shiver ran through her.
"If you had been born Susy, you would still have had God as your loving Father," said Miss Bertha. "Does little Susy know about God, do you think?"
"She doesn't know much, for she told me she'd been to Sunday school once, only Saturday and Sunday were the worst days for her father to drink, and so she likes to stay with him."