“You dear little darling, you don't know how awfully sorry Marty is for being so bad to you!”
Then they rubbed their curly heads together until Freddie began to laugh, and in a few moments he was playing with his tin horse as merrily as if nothing had happened, while Marty gathered up and put away her treasures.
“Now, Marty,” said her mother, “you must keep that out of Freddie's sight. He is nothing but a baby, and doesn't know that it is any different from any other box. Let me see where it is broken. Perhaps I can mend it.”
“No, mamma,” said Marty, “I don't want it mended. I am going to let it be this way to remind me of how naughty I was to my dear little brother, and maybe it will keep me from getting so angry with him again. It does seem dreadful, too, to think that just when I'm trying to be good to children away over the sea, I should be partic'lerly bad to my own little brother, doesn't it?”
“I sha'n't say a word,” replied her mother, “for I see you can rebuke yourself.”
So the broken missionary box was a constant reminder to Marty that her work for those far away should make her all the more loving to the dear ones at home.