Those less innocent and pure minded than Phebe Gray, might have thought lightly both of her sister’s fault and its probable punishment, but to one brought up in the strict discipline of a Connecticut church, and with a deep reverence for all its exactions, any thing like contempt of them was little less than sacrilege; and to be reprimanded by the minister, a disgrace which would have broken poor Phebe’s heart, had she been called upon to endure it instead of her sister. When she reached her room the gentle girl knelt down in the midst of her tears and prayed earnestly, for in all her troubles and in all her tranquil joys, she had a Father to whom she could plead as a little child—a Father in heaven, though she had none on earth.
Phebe was yet kneeling, subdued and tranquilized, for prayer was the poetry of her existence, when the door was flung suddenly open, and Malina entered the chamber, her eyes flashing and her lips trembling with passionate feelings.
“Never!” she exclaimed, while the tears stood on her burning cheeks, “never, never!”
“What has happened—what have they done to you?” inquired her gentle sister, rising from her knees; “Oh Malina, do not look so angry, I scarcely know you with that face.”
“Angry, sister, who would not be angry, persecuted as I am, and all because I would not sit still and be insulted in open church, because I did not cringe in my seat and acknowledge that to hear a sermon from any man but Minister Brown was a deadly sin; but I will never listen to him again, never enter the old meeting-house while he preaches there—I will take a vow here—and this moment.”
As she spoke, the excited girl snatched the pocket Bible which her mother had replaced on the toilet, and was about to press her burning lips upon the cover, but Phebe sprung forward, laid her small hand on the book, and turned her pale earnest face on the excited features of her sister.
“Malina!” she said.
There was something solemn and sweet in the tones with which this little word was uttered—a look of awe and wonder in the large blue eyes which Phebe Gray lifted to her sister’s face, which would have checked the passions of a fiend—a flood of crimson rushed over Malina’s face, she laid the Bible down, covered her eyes with both hands, and shuddered amid her tears with a sense of the sacrilege which she had been tempted to commit. Phebe drew her gently to the bed, and when they were seated she placed an arm around her neck, and kissed the trembling fingers that covered her eyes.
“Don’t cry,” she said softly, repeating her kiss, “they have been harsh, perhaps, but it was intended for your good.”
Malina suddenly removed her hands—dashing the tears from her eyes with the action—while her lips and cheeks began to glow again.