CHAPTER II.
It was Mercy Fisher who sat in the room to the left of the bar, and played with the children, and laughed when they laughed, and tried to forget that she was not as young as they were, and as happy and as free from thought, living as they lived, from hour to hour, with no past, and without a future, and all in the living present. But she was changed, and was now no longer quite a child, though she had a child's heart that would never grow old, but be a child's heart still, all the same that the weight of a woman's years lay upon it, and the burden of a woman's sorrow saddened it. A little older, a little wiser, perhaps, a little graver of face, and with eyes a little more wistful.
A neighbor who had gone to visit a relative five miles away had brought round her children, begging the "young missy" to take care of them in her absence. A curly-headed boy of four sat wriggling in Mercy's lap, while a girl of six stood by her side, watching the needles as she knitted. And many a keen thrust the innocent, prattling tongues sent straight as an arrow to Mercy's heart. The little fellow was revolving a huge lozenge behind his teeth.
"And if oo had a little boy would oo give him sweets ery often—all days—sweets and cakes—would oo?"
"Yes, every day, darling; I'd give him sweets and cakes every day."
"I 'ikes oo. And would oo let him go out to play with the big boys, and get birds' nests and things, would oo?"
"Yes, bird's nests, and berries, and everything."
"I 'ikes oo, I do. And let him go to meet daddy coming home at night, and ride on daddy's back?"
A shadow shot across the girl's simple face, and there was a pause.
"Would oo? And lift him on daddy's shoulder, would oo?"