"Oh! but there's no one else to do it if I don't, you see," quoth the little dress-maker, almost cheerfully—as cheerfully, that is, as her voice could be made to speak; but Kathie noticed that a moment after she pressed her hand on her side and drew a sharp, hard breath.
"Does your side pain you, Miss Atkinson?" she asked, kindly.
"Not much more than usual. It's rather bad, most days. I went to work too soon after I was sick, the doctor said. But he didn't tell me how the rest were going to live if I laid by any longer; and, dear me, I'm thankful enough to be able to work at all."
Kathie thought she should be ashamed to have this poor little woman, who had two people besides herself to provide for, entirely, and no knowing how many more, in part, work on her blue silk superfluity. Clearly that must be made by some other dress-maker; and she could not even speak to her mother about it now; so she just asked for some work, and sat down with it, thinking more seriously than, perhaps, she had ever thought in her gay, butterfly life before.
"How old is your little niece, Alice?" she asked, after a while.
"Ten, and she is as far along in her studies now as a good many girls of twelve. I did mean to have sent her straight through, normal school and all, and let her prepare to be a teacher; but it doesn't look much like it, now William's taken so poorly. I expect I shall have to pretty much clothe his three children besides Alice."
"Can't your sister, little Alice's mother, help you at all?"
"Well, yes, she does help. She does all she's able to, and more; for, you see, she's feeble, too. She keeps house for us, and cooks, and washes and makes our things after I fit them, and keeps us mended; but there's nothing she can do to bring in any thing. But there, I beg your pardon ten times over, apiece. It's against my principles to go out sewing, and harrow up folks' minds with my troubles; only, you see, I'm a little nervous and unsettled to-day on account of Alice's crying pretty hard this morning because she hadn't any thing to wear to school."
Papa Mason took Kathie aside when he came home to dinner, and with a little fun, and teasing, and pretence of mystery, produced the check. There it was, one hundred and twenty-five dollars, all right, and three weeks between now and Christmas Eve to get her blue silk gown made.
While she ate her roast beef she began to think again. One question kept asking itself over in her mind,—Why should some people have blue silk gowns, and others have no gowns at all? I rather think we have all asked ourselves this same thing, in one form of words or another. Since the great Father made and loves us all, why should one be Queen Victoria and another little Alice staying at home from school for want of a few yards of woollen and a pair of boots? Political economists have ciphered it all out, beautifully; but Kathie did not know that, and so the vexing question puzzled her. What if it was done just to give us a chance to help each other? she asked herself, at last, and the text of a sermon she heard once came into her mind,—"Bear ye one another's burdens." If all fared just alike there would be no chance for helpfulness, or charity, or self-denial; so may be clothes would be put on people's backs at the expense of better things in their hearts. It must be that God knew best. Oh! if one couldn't think that, the world might as well fall to pieces at once.