Phœbe Daring,
Donald Daring,
Committee.”
This paper was made out in duplicate and a copy given to Sue and one to Cousin Judith. Sue promptly tore up her paper and scattered the pieces over the hall floor. Then she left the house and went away to play with some of her girl friends.
Cousin Judith asked the others not to taunt or reproach the girl, but to treat her as pleasantly and cordially as before. After supper that evening, they all strolled down to the river to watch the boat crew practice; but Sue was not asked to accompany them. On their return Don told the divorced one of the jolly time they had had, and how Cousin Judith bought them each an ice cream soda at the drug store; but Sue made no reply. When she went to bed she did not, like the others, go to the Little Mother for a good night kiss. In her room she noticed that the covers of her bed had not been turned down, as usual, or her night robe laid out. Becky’s bed, across the room, had been remembered with loving care by Judith, but Sue was no longer her adopted daughter.
This little lack of attention sent the first real pang to the girl’s heart. Silently, she got down her gown from the closet and turned back the covers of her own bed. In the morning she was about to call to Cousin Judith to ask what dress to put on, but remembered in time that she must now choose for herself.
The dressmaker still came to the house every day to sew busily for the needy family. Judith was paying for all the new things with her own money, which she had saved from the sale of her pictures, and therefore Sue was not surprised when her pretty pink challis was laid aside and put into a drawer unfinished, while a gown of Becky’s was brought out and given the dressmaker to work upon. Sue told herself she must expect such things to happen under the new order of things; only—only she would have liked that pink dress; it was so soft and pretty.
The divorced one made no complaint, however she might feel the difference between her position and that of her brothers and sisters. Sue was old enough to understand that she must pay the penalty for her rebellion, and if at times she repented her stubbornness it was in secret and no word of regret passed her lips. Judith spoke to her with uniform kindliness and so did the other members of the family; yet Sue realized she was an outcast, and no longer entitled to a place in the inner circle.
This ostracism was more acutely defined when the Little Mother one morning called her flock into her room for a conference. Sue stayed away, being an outsider, and listened to the merry laughter that at times penetrated the closed doors and saluted her ears. Undoubtedly it was a trial to the younger girl to be debarred from such good fellowship, and as she sat in her lonely corner she sadly recalled the jolly times she had once had in Cousin Judith’s pleasant room.
“So you’s a orfin ag’in, is yo’?” remarked Aunt Hyacinth, coming upon her as Sue sat nursing her gloomy thoughts. “Ain’t yo’ got no sense a’tall, Miss Sue, to go a-flyin’ in de face o’ Prov’dence dis a-way?”
“You mind your own business, Aunt Hy.”
“Dat’s what I’m doin’, honey. Mah bus’ness is to see you all happy, an’ here yo’ goes an’ makes yo’se’f a outcast an’ a orfin, when yo’ had a good Li’l Motheh to tek care o’ yo’. Ain’ dere no way to divohce dat divohce, an’ git back in de sunshine ag’in’?”