The Youngest Sister: A Tale of Manitoba

by Bessie Marchant

Anne taught the township school, earning enough to keep home together, and out of school hours she made their frocks, and did all sorts of things to make the little income go as far as possible. Hilda, on her part, worked away at scales, exercises, and fugues on the little old piano, which had been a wedding present to their dead mother. Then, when by sheer pluck and perseverance she had pulled through sufficient exams to give her a teaching certificate, she had hunted round for pupils. There had been few enough to be found in Mestlebury, which was on the northern coast of Nova Scotia, but she had gone inland among the farmers who were well-to-do, and so had gathered a little teaching connection, the fees from which were added to the family funds.

But Hilda knew very well that she had touched only the barest fringe of musical knowledge, even though she was the best player and the best teacher for many miles round. It was the dream of her life to go to Europe, to get at least a year of study in Germany, and to hear some really good musicians. The dream seemed very far off realization, however, and meanwhile she was travelling long distances, getting cheap pupils, and struggling to keep herself in the public eye, which, after all, is the only way to get on as a travelling music teacher. This she had long since discovered, and she was astute enough to take the utmost advantage of every opportunity which presented itself for making her way.

Bertha was the disappointment of the family, for she was only a dreamer, while the other two were workers, and very hard workers, their lot being all the more toilsome because she did so little. She wrote little poems, in which heart rhymed with part, and that contained many references to soulful yearnings which stayed unsatisfied. Sometimes she even attempted short stories; but these were so morbid in sentiment, that Anne would have turned sick at such mawkish rubbish, while Hilda would have gone into fits of laughter and made fun of them for months afterwards.

But neither sister ever did see them, and Bertha wasted precious hours over her futile scribbling which had been much more usefully employed in looking after the comfort of the two elder sisters, who worked so hard and had no time to waste in dreaming at all.

Poor child! she believed herself to be a genius, and secretly she looked forward to the time when she should burst upon the world with a full-blown literary reputation, without any preliminary preparation of climbing and falling, only to climb again. If anyone had told her that genius was only an infinite capacity for hard work in any given direction, it is to be feared that she would not have believed it, but would have still dreamed on, expecting to wake some day to find herself famous.

If there had been anyone in her little world of whom she could have made a confidante, her eyes might have been the sooner opened to her mistakes; but the three girls kept very much to themselves, and Bertha would just as soon have thought of standing on her head in Mestlebury Main Street, as of confiding any of her aspirations to her sisters.

So she emerged slowly from girlhood, growing more dreamy and futile with every month that passed over her head, until that day in the autumn when she had walked to Paston in the morning with Hilda to help carry some music to the train depot, and had come back by way of the shore, to find the man on the Shark’s Teeth. It was old Jan Saunders who had torn the veil from her eyes and had made her see that it is a finer thing to be up and doing, ready to help where help is needed, than to spend one’s time in thinking noble thoughts, which never by any chance developed into works of practical kindness and utility.

And the firstfruits of her awakening had been an intense but wholly salutary disgust of herself and all her previous doings. It was this feeling which had sent her scurrying along Mestlebury Main Street half-clad, and dripping with water from her swim, in order that she might be home in time to get supper ready for Anne.

But she had not reckoned upon a visitor, and when Anne appeared with the stranger, who was introduced as Mr. Roger Mortimer, from Adelaide, Australia, Bertha was so upset by the thought of what she must look like, that she would thankfully have run away if she could.

There was no chance of this, however, for Mr. Mortimer at once proceeded to make himself so much at home and to engross her attention, that presently she even forgot how frightfully untidy she was. He toasted more bread while she buttered the slices and spread the white monkey upon them; he even made the coffee while she finished setting the table, and by the time that Anne came out of her bedroom ready for supper, Bertha felt as if she had known the genial Australian for quite a long time.