Could it be that, after all, Joyce was only thought of as the child-friend of her son's youthful days? Contradictory as this may seem, Mrs. Caruth was quite prepared to be indignant, should this prove to be the case, and to ask what he could want in a wife which he would not find in Joyce? Also, where should she meet one whom she would so gladly welcome as a daughter?
This second letter from Mrs. Caruth delighted Joyce, as may well be imagined. One of her troubles in connection with the coming season had been caused by the thought of her poor friends at Welton. The new clergyman had a delicate wife and a family of young children. He could not take up Joyce's old work, and there was no one else to step into the gap and do it.
Joyce one day accompanied Mrs. Ross in a drive to town, and while she was buying Christmas gifts for her friends and household, the girl strolled through the market, crowded to overflowing with everything suggestive of good cheer. She asked prices, and began to calculate how many dinners the utmost amount she could spare would purchase for some of her poorest friends at Welton. She had already occupied her spare moments in making a number of pretty and useful articles for them.
Joyce sighed as she said to herself—
"The most I can do is so little when compared with their need and my desire to help them; but I must do my best and leave the rest."
Now she knew that all would be remembered, and was thankful on their behalf, whilst again and again the memory of one sentence in Mrs. Caruth's letter brought a bright flush to her cheek.
"Alec bade me tell you that none for whom you cared shall be forgotten, and all will know that they owe their Christmas dinners this year to your loving thought and labour in former seasons. I am sure the good cheer will taste twice as good when it is known that you, dear Joyce, though absent, have your full share in its distribution."
"I should be wicked and ungrateful indeed, if I could cherish a single discontented thought," she said to herself; and she worked cheerfully on, completing her little presents. To each article she attached a short note and a card painted by her own hand, for Joyce was no mean artist, and could use pencil and brush with considerable skill.
There was something for each friend at Welton, Mrs. Caruth included; something for all at Springfield Park, for though Joyce had not found time to do so much during her residence there, she had brought with her many pretty articles, on which she had occupied what would otherwise have been weary days at The Chase.
There was only one friend to whom no Christmas gift was addressed, and that was Major Caruth.