“Oh, I mean my then mother,” he returned hastily, as though answering her unspoken thought. “I was very young when she died, but I have never forgotten her. She was not a lady by birth, you know; only a farmer’s or yeoman’s daughter, but there is not a lady living who is prettier or sweeter than she was.”
“I am glad you feel like that to your mother,” replied Bessie, in a sympathetic voice that seemed to ask for further confidence.
Richard Sefton had never spoken of his mother to any one before. What could have drawn the beloved name from his lips? Was it this girl’s soothing presence, or the stillness of the hour and the quiet beauty of the scene round him? Richard was impressionable by nature, and possibly each of these things influenced him. It was a new pleasure to speak to a kindly listener of the memories that lay hidden in his faithful heart.
“Yes, and yet I was a mere child when I lost her,” he went on, and there was a moved look on his face; “but I remember her as plainly as I see you now. She was so young and pretty—every one said so. I remember once, when I was lying in my little cot one night, too hot and feverish to sleep, that she came up to me in her white gown—it was made of some shining stuff, silk or satin—and she had a sparkling cross on her neck. I remember how it flashed in my eyes as she stooped to kiss me, and how she carried me to the window to look at the stars. ‘Are they not bright, Ritchie?’ she said; ‘and beyond there is the great beautiful heaven, where my little boy will go some day;’ and then she stood rocking me in her arms. I heard her say plainly, ‘Oh, that I and my little child were there now!’ And as she spoke something wet fell on my face. I have heard since that she was not happy—not as happy as she ought to have been, poor mother!”
“And is that all you can remember?” asked Bessie gently.
“Oh, no; I have many vague recollections of making daisy chains with my mother on the lawn; of a great yellow cowslip ball flung to me in the orchard; of a Sunday afternoon, when some pictures of Samuel, and David and Goliath, were shown me; and many other little incidents. Children do remember, whatever grown-up people say.”
“I think it would be terrible to lose one’s mother, especially when one is a child,” observed Bessie, in a feeling voice.
“I have found it so, I assure you,” replied Richard gravely. “My stepmother was young, and did not understand children—boys especially. I seemed somewhat in the way to every one but my father. A lonely childhood is a sad thing; no success nor happiness in after life seems to make up for it.”
“I understand what you mean; father always says children claim happiness as a right.”
“It is most certainly their prerogative; but I fear I am boring you with my reminiscences.”