“It’s too bad!” said Miss Judy; “I declare it’s really too bad!” and she came stumping along the road; after her nurse, looking decidedly “put out.”
“It would be something new if it wasn’t too bad with you, Miss Judy, about something or other,” said, nurse coolly.
Miss Judy was a kind-hearted, gentle-mannered little girl. She was pretty and healthy and clever—the sort of child any parents might have been proud of, any brothers and sisters fond of, had not all her niceness been spoiled by one most disagreeable fault. She was always grumbling. The hot days of summer, the cold days of winter, the rain, the wind, the dust, might, to hear her speak, have been expressly contrived to annoy her. When it was fine, and the children were to go out a walk, Miss Judy was sure to have something she particularly wanted to stay in for; when it rained, and the house was evidently the best place for little people, Miss Judy was quite certain to have set her heart upon going out. She grumbled at having to get up, she grumbled at having to go to bed, she grumbled at lessons, she grumbled at play; she could not see that little contradictions and annoyances come to everybody in the world, and that the only way to do is to meet them bravely and sensibly. She really seemed to believe that nobody had so much to bear as she; that on her poor little shoulders all the tiresomenesses and disappointments, and “going the wrong way” of things, were heaped in double, and more than double quantities, and she persuaded herself that everybody she saw was better off in every way than herself, and that no one else had such troubles to bear. So, children, you will not be surprised to hear that poor Miss Judy was not loved or respected as much as some little girls who perhaps really deserved love and respect less. For this ugly disagreeable fault of hers hid all her good qualities; and just as flowers cannot flourish when shaded from the nice bright sun by some rank, wide-spreading weed, so Judy’s pretty blossoms of kindness and unselfishness and truthfulness, which were all really there, were choked and withered by this poisonous habit of grumbling.
I do not really remember what it was she was grumbling at this particular morning. I daresay it was that the roads were muddy, for it was autumn, and Judy’s home was in the country. Or, possibly, it was only that nurse had told her to walk a little quicker, and that immediately her boots began to hurt her, or the place on her heel where once there had been a chilblain got sore, or the elastic of her hat was too loose, and her hat came flopping down on to her face. It might have been any of these things. Whatever it was, it was “too bad.” That, whenever Miss Judy was concerned, you might be quite, quite sure of.
They were returning home from rather a long walk. It was autumn, as I said, and there had been a week or two of almost constant rain, and certainly country lanes are not very pleasant at such times. If Judy had not grumbled so at everything, she might have been forgiven for this special grumble (if it was about the roads), I do think. It was getting chilly and raw, and the clouds looked as if the rain was more than half thinking of turning back on its journey to “Spain,” or wherever it was it had set off to. Nurse hurried on; she was afraid of the little ones in the perambulator catching cold, and she could not spare time to talk to Miss Judy any longer.
Judy came after her slowly; they were just passing some cottages, and at the door of one of them stood a girl of about Judy’s age, with her mouth open, staring at “the little gentry.” She had heard what had passed between Judy and her nurse, and was thinking it over in her own way. Suddenly Judy caught sight of her.
“What are you staring at so?” she said sharply. “It’s too bad of you. You are a rude little girl. I’ll tell nurse how rude you are.”
Judy did not generally speak so crossly, especially not to poor children, for she had really nice feelings about such things, but she was very much put out, and ashamed too, that her ill-natured words to nurse should have been overheard, so she expressed her vexation to the first object that came in her way. The little girl did not leave off staring at her; in fact she did so harder than before. But she answered Judy gently, growing rather red as she did so; and Judy felt her irritation cool.
“I didn’t mean no offence,” she said. “I were just looking at you, and thinking to be sure how nice you had everything, and a wondering how it could be as you weren’t pleased.”