"But, my dear Mrs. Henderson, excuse my asking, had Effie a proper place in which to put her little treasures?"
Mrs. Henderson seemed half-amused, half-scornful, at the very idea of such a thing. "No, indeed," she replied; "I do not set aside a place for mere rubbish. Effie must learn to do without such trash as that I have burned."
"She will in time, let us hope; but all those shreds of silk, and odds and ends, which are valueless to you and me, are very precious in the eyes of a little girl. I can assure you my two children have just such collections, but so far from destroying them, I am constantly applied to for additional scraps to eke out their treasures. Of course I insist on their being put away when done with; but the children have no excuse for untidiness, because each has a drawer for her property. I presume Effie's fault has been that of making your beautiful home look untidy by strewing it with her odds and ends?"
Airs. Henderson made a gesture of assent. She had felt annoyed that Mrs. Elwood should interfere even in such a gentle manner, and now, though somewhat mollified by the deserved compliment paid her by the lady, she did not regret when the visitor rose to take her leave.
There were sorrowful faces at home when Mrs. Elwood reached it, and even the kind doctor's good-humoured countenance was overclouded when he asked in vain for little pet Effie.
"It seems strange," said he, when his wife told him the cause of the child's absence, "that so few people have patience and love enough to deal with children. But poor Margaret Henderson is like many others; she cannot forgive Him who has seen fit to afflict her; and because He has taken away one blessing, she flings the rest after it, and will have none. What froward children we are in the sight of our heavenly Father."
Mrs. Henderson's cottage looked beautiful indeed that evening, but the heart of its mistress was not at rest. She could see nothing but the little sorrowful figure, with clasped hands and streaming eyes; and that look, so like the dead father that she almost fancied she heard his voice pleading that she would love their child, and be very tender with her for his sake.
Conscience was busy with Margaret. It brought before her the many blessings she had slighted because one was taken away, her own unthankfulness of heart, her unloving ways with those about her.
Visions, too, of her own bright childhood filled the heart of the lonely woman, and she contrasted it with Effie's, such as she had made it. Her own had been all love from the first day that she, the youngest lamb of the fold, could remember, to that on which, with a father's blessing ringing in her ears, she had left her childhood's home for the far distant roof of her sailor-husband. All her own coldness and unkindness, the many times she had cast off the little clinging arms, and turned her cheek away from the proffered kiss, the harsh words of reproof which the slightest fault had been sufficient to call forth upon her child, and the difference between Effie's home and out-door looks, rose plainly before her.
And then, as she sat with the fire-light shining upon her pretty room, she became sensible of the value of her comforts, as she had never been before. God's long-suffering and goodness, too, were made apparent, and the words, "Shall I receive good at the hand of the Lord, and shall I not receive evil?" came into her mind. "He has taken away ONE good gift," she murmured; "oh, Frank! But He has left me all beside, and I have thanked Him for nothing. Yet, instead of wishing, as I have often done, that I had never owned the lost blessing, ought I not rather to thank God that I have so sweet a memory of my short married life, unmarred by the recollection of one unloving word?"