“It is all real to her, though. One would think, to see her sitting there, that there is nothing in the world that has the power to trouble her long. And there really is nothing, if she is a child of God—as she says. What a strange thing it is!”
She sat watching the little absorbed face, thinking over her own vexed thoughts, till the old restless feeling would let her sit no longer. Rising, she went to the window and looked out.
“What a gloomy day it is!” she said. “How low the clouds are, and how dim and grey the light is! And listen to the wind moaning and sighing among the trees! It is very dreary. Don’t you think so, Christie?”
Christie looked up. “Yes, now that you speak of it, it does seem dreary; at least, it seems dreary outside. And I dare say it seems dreary in the house to you. Have they all gone out?”
“Yes; and there is to be no six o’clock dinner. They are to dine in town and go to some lecture or other. I almost wish I had gone.”
“I promised Claude that if he was very good he should go down to the drawing-room, and you would sing to us,” said Christie. “We must air the nursery, you know.”
“I have been very good, haven’t I, Tudie?” said the little boy, looking up from the pictures with which he had been amusing himself.
“Very good and sweet, my darling,” said Gertrude, kneeling down by the low chair on which her little brother sat. She put her arms around him, and drawing his head down on her breast, kissed him many times, her heart filling full of tenderness for the fragile little creature. The child laughed softly, as he returned her caresses, stroking her cheeks and her hair with his little thin hand.
“You won’t be cross any more, Tudie?” he said.
“I don’t know, dear. I don’t mean to be cross, but I dare say I shall be, for all that.”