"The question is," she says, gravely, "can you suggest anything better? When one has no money, and none of the acquirements that command money, one must take what one can get, and be thankful."
But Mrs. Brandon is silent, counting her stitches, buried in calculations as to whether her stocking-leg has attained the length and breadth suited to the dimensions of one of her son's large limbs.
The wind shakes the shutter as if, in its lonely coldness outside, it coveted the fire and lamp-light. The old grey cat sits on the fender-stool beside Esther, yawning prodigiously every now and then; her round fore-paws gathered trimly under her, and the sleepy benignity of her face half-contradicting the fierce stiffness of her whiskers, and the tigerish upward curve of her lips.
"What is done in haste is always ill-done, my dear!" says Mrs. Brandon, presently, having satisfactorily calculated that five more rows will conduct her to Bob's large heel—giving utterance to her little trite saw with a certain air of complacency. Original remarks come forth doubtfully, questioningly, feeling their way: it is only a well aired platitude that can strut and swagger forwards in the certainty of a good reception. "We will think over the subject seriously and prayerfully: we will take it with us to the Throne of Grace, and make it the subject of special intercession of worship this evening."
"Oh no, no! please not!—please not!" cries Esther, the lilies in her fair cheek turning quickly to deepest, angriest carnations. "I should not like it: I could not come to prayers if you did. Why cannot we talk it over now, this instant? There's no time like the present."
"I see no hurry, Esther," answers Mrs. Brandon, coldly.
"But there is a hurry!—every hurry!" exclaims the girl, passionately, throwing herself on the floor beside Mrs. Brandon, too much in earnest to be chilled by the frosty cold of her manner; her whole soul thrown, in bright entreaty, into the great clear pupils of her superb, up-looking eyes. "I don't think I ever knew what the words meant till now. I don't believe I ever could have been in a real hurry in my life before! Put yourself in my position, Mrs. Brandon," she says, laying her little eager hand on her companion's rusty-black-coburg knee; "imagine how you would like to be wholly dependent, not only for luxuries and comforts—one might well do without them—but for bare bread and water, on people that are neither kith nor kin to you, and that have taken you in out of Christian charity, and because they think it right—not in the least because they love you!"
"If I were exposed to such a trial, Esther," replied Mrs. Brandon, deliberately rubbing her spectacles gently with her pocket-handkerchief, "I hope that I should bear it meekly; that I should kiss the rod, knowing that it was an Allwise Hand that brandished it, and that I was so chastened in order to lower the pride of a too carnal heart."
"Then God forbid that my carnal heart may ever be so lowered!" cries the other, springing impetuously to her feet, and drawing up her head haughtily. "Why," she continues, beginning to walk up and down the little room with agitated steps and fingers hotly interlaced—"why did God implant such an instinct as self-respect in us, if supinely submitting to what destroys all self-respect is a passport to heaven? Who would bow beneath any rod if they could get from under it? It is a metaphor that always reminds me of a naughty child, or a broken-spirited cur."
Mrs. Brandon deposits her knitting on the table; rises slowly—old people's joints, like wooden dolls, decline to bend on short notice (it is a pity, is it not, that our machinery is not calculated to remain in a state of efficiency, even through our paltry seventy years?)—dismounts from the footstool, on which her feet have been perched, walks to the door, there stands, and, shaking her stiff, grey curls, speaks with trembling severity: