“Oh, Adoniram,” she shut the door and came around to his chair, “we must do something for that child—for all those children.” She seized his well-worn sleeve and held it fast.
“I know—I know,” Parson Henderson nodded, thoughtfully, “and there’s Ben. I must confess, Almira, I get to thinking of him so much it’s hard to shake it off.”
“But he is a boy,” said his wife.
“Even boys can suffer,” observed the parson, dryly.
“Oh, I know, husband.” Mrs. Henderson now gripped his coat collar and peered round into his face anxiously. “You know I think Ben Pepper has an awfully hard time, but, then, he can go out and work, and there’s Polly,—she must stay in and help her mother, and have no schooling and no fun; and then, O dear me, there’s that blessed little thing, Phronsie!”
“Yes, there’s Phronsie,” said the minister, with a twinge at the heart, “and Joel and David; we mustn’t forget them, wife.”
“Oh, I don’t forget them,” cried his wife; “I can’t for a single moment forget any one of those five poor little things. O dear me, if only there weren’t so many of them, Adoniram.”
“And Mrs. Pepper, we mustn’t forget her, either,” the minister drummed on his desk with troubled fingers; “for she has really the hardest time of all.” And he got out of his chair, and drawing his wife’s arm within his own, began to pace over the well-worn carpet.
“Adoniram,” she clutched his arm with her other hand, “just think if I hadn’t seen that child flying off! Just think!” She brought her anxious blue eyes up to his dark ones.
Parson Henderson’s face dropped gloomily. “Yes, we ought to do something to make up for Jerusha.” He brought the last out with a deep flush.