“But if they vex us, why should we vex them? I know I always feel sorry when I have made people angry.”
“Don’t talk to me—I will write such a theme!”
“Ah, Miss Bruce! mamma says we should never do wrong.”
“I wish you would not mention your mamma, for it is a very ugly word.”
“O, Miss Bruce, I never heard such a thing!”
“I once loved it dearly,” said Miss Bruce, in a softened tone. “Those were happy days! I can fancy I see somebody now, sitting up in bed, with her nice white cap, so pale, and so pretty; and somebody kneeling by her, and praying for her, and blessing her. But all would not do, to save one I loved!” Here tears trickled from her eyes: but she suddenly recollected herself; “I must not think of it; it is over, and for ever gone! And now for my theme.”
“Poor Miss Bruce,” said Isabella, in a soothing tone, “I wish you were my sister, and then you would have my mamma, and she would love you so!”
“And do you think I would give up some one, for all the mammas in the world! No, no—there is no one like him. But I will mortify Mrs. Adair, that I will! To think that I must not go to my Aunt’s on Thursday! And there will be my cousins, and Edward Warner, and Margaret James, and some one who is worth them all; though I don’t talk of him as you talk of your Papa.”
After musing a few minutes, with her pencil in her hand, and her head resting upon a slate, she joyfully exclaimed, “I have it, I have it indeed!”
“And what have you got?” cried Isabella, as she sprang from her seat, and looked over Miss Bruce’s shoulder.