“Hugh! Hugh! Don’t talk in that way,” replied Guy, putting his hand playfully over his brother’s mouth.
“Get out!” cried Hugh, pushing his brother’s hand away and walking off in high dudgeon, in search of Walter, who, for some reason, had not come with his sister. His foolish pride had kindled anger in his breast.
Madge, with the usual quickness of girls of her age, had caught enough of Hugh’s words, and of the meaning of his act, to perceive that he was disposed to treat her with scorn. A cloud flitted across her brow, and her eyes flashed. It was clear that the proud, thoughtless boy had wounded her feelings.
“Hugh! Hugh! Don’t carry off my skates!” shouted Jessie, as her brother turned into the main road, from the lawn.
Whirling the skates over the fence, he kept on without a word. The skates, fortunately, fell on a heap of dry leaves and were picked up uninjured by Guy, who, with the three girls, soon found the way to some hollows, in the pasture, near the brook. These hollows, filled with shallow pools of water, now solidly frozen, were excellent places for young misses to slide and skate in.
Madge was not cheerful this afternoon. Hugh had wounded her pride, and stirred her sleeping passions. It was very ungenerous conduct, in a lad of his age, to treat an unfortunate child with scorn. Madge ought not to have allowed her temper to be ruffled. But, alas, poor child! she had not been taught to keep her evil temper under control. So she brooded over Hugh’s conduct. The more she thought of it, the more chafed and angry she felt.
Guy helped Carrie and his sister put on their skates. Jessie had never had a skate upon her foot before. Carrie had learned to use them a little the previous winter. Hence, she glided off something like a swan, while Jessie hobbled and slipped, and tumbled for a long time in vain attempts to keep upright on the ice.
Carrie was so taken up watching the laughable attempts of her friend, that she took no notice of poor Madge. Guy and Jessie were so busy, the former teaching, and the latter learning, that they too forgot her. Poor child! this neglect stung the wound which Hugh’s act had caused, and so, with many a frown and pout, she quietly stole from the hollow to a deeper one in which, by seating herself on a low stump, she could remain unseen.
“They is all proud,” mused Madge, half aloud. “I heard that You, or Hugh, whatever they call him, say ‘beggar’s brat.’ I know he meant me, and I know he went off cause I was with ’em. And there’s them gals; they don’t care for me a bit. Drat ’em! I wish mother would go away from here.”
This was very foolish talk for Madge. Had she looked on the kind side of her new-found friends, and thought of their gifts to her, and of the pleasant home they had given her and her mother for the time-being, and of their gentle words, she would have seen so much to be grateful for, that there would have been no room in her heart for unhappy feelings. But Madge forgot all these things. She saw nothing but Hugh’s scorn and Jessie’s neglect. With these she tortured herself. It was just as foolish as if she had taken some sharp thorns and scratched her arms and cheeks with them.