Mr. Moore was so amazed and pleased at this new character exhibited by his daughter that he scarcely knew what to say.
“I am very sorry it is so, Margaret, but your mother is very sick. She has been under a great strain this summer. You will have to wait on her and be a general help. I would hire some one else to do it if I could afford it, but I cannot. Your mother’s sister, Amelia, who has been living in Brierly with her brother, will come, I think, and keep house, and then the minister need not go away, for we need all the money we can get now to pay the doctor’s bills.”
THERE SAT JOHNNIE.
Margaret’s face fell.
“Must we have her? Isn’t there some one else we can have?” she said, lowering her voice.
“Not without paying for it,” said her father, sadly.
“Couldn’t I do the work?” she asked.
“No, Margaret; you will have all you can do to wait on your mother, and,” he added, “I am afraid you cannot even go to school here at home,—for a time, at least. I am sorry, but I don’t see any other way out just now.”
Margaret felt very much like bursting into tears again, but a glance at her father’s worn face changed her feelings.