“Twenty years is a lifetime of itself,” said her mistress; “it might not be twenty days nor twenty hours. The like of us have no right to reckon our time.”
“It’s time for me to buckle my shoon to my feet, and my cloak to my shouthers, if you’re thinking upon your call,” said Jenny. “But, no to be ill-mannered, putting my forbears in ae word with yours, we’re baith come of a lang-lived race—and you’re just in your prime, as weel as ever ye was; and ’deed, I canna think it onything but a reflection upon myself, that maybe might get to the kirk mair constant if I was to try, when I hear ye speaking like that to puir auld wizened Jenny, that’s six and fifty guid, no to speak of the thraw she’s had a’ her days.”
And a single hot tear of petulant distress fell upon Jenny’s arm.
“Well, Jenny,” said Mrs Laurie, “one thing we’ll agree in, I know—you could not wish so ill a wish to Menie, poor thing, as that she might leave this world before her mother. You would think it in the course of nature that Menie should see both you and me in our graves. Now, if I was taken away next week, or next year,—what is my poor bairn to do?”
And Jenny vainly fuffed to conceal the little fit of sobbing which this idea brought upon her. “Do! She’ll be married upon her ain gudeman lang years afore that time comes; and Randall Home’s a decent lad, though I’ll no say he would have just taken my fancy, if onybody had askit me; and she’ll hae a hunder pound or twa to keep her pocket, of what you’re aye saving for her; and I have twa-three bawbees laid up in the bank mysel.”
“Ay, Jenny, so have I,” said her mistress; “but two or three hundred pounds is a poor provision for a young friendless thing like Menie; and I have nothing but a liferent in Burnside; and my annuity, you know, ends with me. No doubt there’s Randall Home to take into consideration; but the two of them are very young, Jenny, and many a thing may come in the way. I would like Menie to have something else to depend on than Randall Home.”
“Bless me, mem, you’ve a mote in your een the day,” said Jenny impatiently. “What’s the puir callant done now? They tell me he’s as weel-doing a lad as can be, and what would onybody have mair?”
“Hush, Jenny,” said Mrs Laurie, “and hear me to an end. This lady has a better income than I have, and she says we may lay our savings together for Menie—a very good offer; and Menie can get better education, whatever may happen to her; and we can see with our own eyes how Randall Home is coming on in the world; for you see, Jenny, I have a kind of right to be selfish on Menie’s account. I’ve tried poverty myself in my day; and Menie is my only bairn.”
The tears came into the mother’s eyes. Menie had not always been her only bairn; and visions of a bold brother, two years older than her little girl, and natural protector and champion of Menie, flashed up before her in the bright air of this home room, where ten years ago her first-born paled and sickened to his early death.
“I wouldna gang—no a fit,” exclaimed Jenny, breaking into a little passion of anger and tears. “Wha’s trusting in Providence now—wha’s leaving the ane out of the question that has a’ in His hands—and making plans like as if He didna remain when we were a’ away? I didna think there had been sae little mense—I couldna have believed there was sae little grace in a house like this—and I wouldna gang a fit—no me—as if I thought Providence was owre puir an inheritance for the bairn!”