“Ah, if they were only all like you,” replied Fred, rising to come to me, and then falling back on the sofa with a growl at the pain the attempt had caused his sprained ankle. Gentle reader, that sprain, which had confined him four days to the sofa, was the sole reason why my good-natured, sensible brother was so “uncommon” cross.
There was a pause, during which Fred cut his nails and I sewed most industriously. “I think,” said he at length—but what he thought was lost forever to the world, for at that moment the door opened and Hattie entered.
“Speak of angels and one sees their wings,” said I, as I rose to welcome her. “You have come just in time to verify the proverb, for we have been speaking of you.” Fred gave me a beseeching glance. He did not know of a plan I had formed, which was quite inconsistent with any attempt to prejudice Miss Atherton against him.
“I hope angels don’t tear their wings as badly as I have torn my shawl. I have come to you for aid, and you see I carry a flag of distress,” replied Hattie, holding out her shawl that had one corner nearly torn off.
“How did you get such a rent in it?” exclaimed I.
“I have been paying a visit to your friend, Murray, and caught it on a nail in his door,” said she laughing.
“What in the world were you doing at Murray’s?”
“I went down to see his child. When I looked out of my window this morning, I was horrified to see that hop pole, whose graceful clusters we were admiring yesterday, lying on the ground, and shorn of its glories. On inquiring the cause of this outrage, I found that Murray went to our house last evening for some hops to make a tea for a sick child, and mother told him to get some from this pole. In doing so, he managed, with Irish dexterity, to throw it down directly across the bed of Dahlias.”
“Your beautiful Dahlias—what a pity!”
“I was very sorry, but fortunately they are not all destroyed. I thought the poor man must have been in desperate haste to do such a thing, and so I went to see if the child were dangerously sick.”