Katie Robertson

by Margaret E. Winslow

Then, too, the question with which the reading closed: "Will you now thus confess Christ?" How could she answer it? Was she in a fit state for so solemn an action, she, a butterfly flitting from one avocation to another, with no thought or aim beyond pleasing herself? She knew she was not. She had given up the child-habit of "saying her prayers," and she had never learned really to pray. Until she took that class she had not, for some years, voluntarily opened her Bible, and now she knew that all her energetic study of the technicalities of the Holy Word had in it no grain of desire to please or glorify God. Even her devotion to Sunday-school teaching, usually supposed to be Christian work, had in it no leaven of Christianity, being only self-pleasing from end to end. Etta was sufficiently clear-sighted to see all this. She knew that she never thought of God. His approval or disapproval was all one to her, and while she had never denied or openly scoffed at religion, and had no reason to doubt the truths of its facts and doctrines, she was, so far as anything practical went, not a Christian at all. What had she to "confess"? And yet, how strange it would seem if some of those to whom she stood in the position of teacher, who of necessity looked up to and imitated her, should become Christians and church members, when she had never taken the same stand. Stranger still, and worse, if they should be deterred from what seemed to them a duty by the example of their Sunday-school teacher. Etta had never been placed in such a dilemma before, and she heartily wished either that her sister had not invited her class, or that the class had not accepted the invitation, and that the girls would never come again, and yet she hardly liked to advise them not to do so.

"I don't like that kind of a party at all," said Bertie Sanderson, when the group of younger girls were well out of hearing of the house. "She just got us there under false pretences, calling it fun and turning it into a sort of church. We get prayers enough, in all conscience, on Sundays."

"I'd rather have Miss Etta talk to us about the patriarchs and the stories and all that," said Matilda Eckart, who was a good scholar, or would have been if she had not, by the necessities of her family, been forced to work in the mill. "I like to learn things; still I like Miss Eunice, too. She's real sweet, and maybe we ought to do as she says."

"Nonsense!" said another girl, Helen Felting by name, "Miss Etta isn't a Christian, and she's her own sister and three or four years older than we are. I don't want to be any better than she is. My, ain't her dress lovely, all silk and velvet, and such an exquisite shade! fits so, too, just as if it was her skin!"

"Did you see her ear-rings?" said another. "Real diamonds, all set round with pearls, and such a chain and locket!"

"I don't care," said Bertie; meaning, of course, that she did care very much. "We girls haven't got so much money and we can't have real things. I like my chain and locket just as well (which she didn't, for she was quite keen enough to understand the difference), but I won't go there again till I get my silk dress made;" and she glanced disgustedly at the light-blue cashmere which, as it was her best dress, she chose to wear on all occasions, and which looked already much the worse for its week in the rag-room at the mill.

Katie Robertson did not speak at all, except to answer the questions of Eric, who had come for her, as to whether she had had a pleasant time decidedly in the affirmative. She was thinking very deeply. We have seen that our Katie was a faithful, conscientious little girl, loving God sincerely, trusting in her Saviour, and striving to please him and grow like him. She loved to study the Bible, which she knew was his word, and to pray to him in her own simple language every night and morning; nay, often at other times when she felt the need of his help, or had something she wanted to tell him about. She had not asked herself any hard questions yet about whether she were a Christian or not. She knew she was her mother's Katie because she loved her mother and wanted to please her, and she knew she was God's child because she loved him and wanted to please him. She often did things, and said things, and thought things that she knew were displeasing to both, but she did not want to do so. She was always very sorry, she always asked to be forgiven and believed she was, for did not her mother say so each time, and had not her heavenly Father promised so once for all in the Bible?

But this afternoon the thought had really come to her that she ought publicly to confess herself a Christian; and yet she shrank from it, she hardly knew why. She was afraid she might afterward do something which would disgrace such a holy profession; and yet, if her Saviour commanded it, as he certainly did, that made it a duty, and, of course, she ought to obey, trusting him to help her keep all the promises as he had promised to do. He would like it, too, so much; it would be easier afterward to resist temptation and to "stand up for Jesus" among her companions.

Katie's thoughts were very busy ones, and by the time she came in sight of her home she had decided that, if her mother and the pastor had no objection, she would give in her name among those who were, at the first opportunity, to confess Christ.

The Wednesday afternoon meetings were continued throughout the spring and early summer, and were attended by all the members of Miss Eunice's class, nearly all those of her sister's, and five or six other girls who accepted the kind invitation of the former. There was always the same hospitality, always the same warm welcome, and always the same grave but happy earnestness on the part of the young lady on whom God had laid this great work. As the warm days came on, the meetings were adjourned to the velvety, close-shaven lawn, where chairs and rustic seats were clustered under the shade of a great, wide-spreading tree, and the sweet, holy themes of reading and conversation seemed all the sweeter that they were henceforth associated with blue sky, bright flowers, white clouds, green leaves, and the other things made by the God who was even now calling these young hearts into his service.