What She Could

Mr. Richmond said no more, but after another hymn and a prayer dismissed the assembly. Maria and Matilda presently found themselves side by side in the street.

"Maria," said the younger one, "don't you think you and I will go and read to those two poor people in the lane?"

"I guess I will!" said Maria, "when I get done being chief cook and bottle-washer to Mrs. Minny Candy."

"But before that, Maria?"

"When shall I go?" said Maria, sharply. "When it is time to get breakfast? or when the potatoes are on for dinner? or when I am taking the orders for tea? Don't be a goose, Matilda, if you can help it."

"We haven't much time," said Matilda, sighing.

"And I am not going to Lilac Lane, if I had it. There are enough other people to do that."

"O Maria!"

"Well, 'O Maria,' – there are."

"But they do not go."

"That's their look out."

"And, Maria, you see what Mr. Richmond thinks about the Dows."

"I don't see any such thing."

"You heard him to-night."

"He didn't say a word about the Dows."

"But about trying again, he did. O Maria, I've thought a great many times of that Dows' house."

"So have I," said Maria; "what fools we were."

"Why?"

"Why, because it was no use."

"Mr. Richmond doesn't think so."

"He's welcome to go and try for himself. I am not going again."

"What is the matter, Maria?"

"Nothing is the matter."

"But, Maria, ever since you joined the Band, I cannot remember once seeing you 'buy up opportunities.' If you loved Jesus, I think you would."

"I wouldn't preach," said Maria. "That is one thing I wouldn't do. If I was better than my neighbours, I'd let them be the ones to find it out."

Matilda was silent till they reached home.

"Where have you been, Matilda?" said her aunt, opening the parlour door.

"To see Miss Redwood, aunt Candy."

"Ask me, next time, before going anywhere. Here has Maria had everything to do since five hours ago, – all alone."

Matilda shut her lips firmly, – if her head took a more upright set on her shoulders she did not know it, – and went up-stairs after her sister.

"How is mamma, Maria?" she asked, when she got there.

"I don't know. Just the same."

The little girl sighed.

"What is to be for breakfast?"

"Fish balls."

"You do not know how to make them."

"Aunt Erminia told me. But I shall want your help, Tilly, for the fish has to be carefully picked all to pieces; and if we leave a bit as big as a sixpence, there'll be a row."

"But the fish isn't soaked, Maria."

"It is in hot water on the stove now. It will be done by morning."

Matilda sighed again deeply, and knelt down before the table where her Bible was open. "Buying up opportunities" floated through her head; with "works, and love, and service, and faith, and patience, and works"* [*Alford's translation.] – "Christ pleased not Himself" – and the little girl's head went down upon the open page. How much love she must have, to meet all the needs for it! to do all the works, have all the patience, buy up all the opportunities! Tilly's one prayer was that she might be full of love, first to God and then to everybody.

Such prayers are apt to be answered; and the next morning saw her go through all the details of its affairs with a quiet patience and readiness which must have had a deep spring somewhere. She helped Maria in the tedious picking out of the fish; she roasted her cheeks in frying the balls, while her sister was making porridge; she attended to the coffee; and she met her aunt and cousin at breakfast with an unruffled quiet sweetness of temper. It was just the drop of oil needed to keep things going smoothly; for Maria was tired and out of humour, and Mrs. Candy disposed to be ill-pleased with both the girls for their being out at the Band meeting. She did not approve of the whole thing, she said. However, the sunshine scattered the clouds away. And when, after a busy morning and a pretty well got-up dinner, Matilda asked leave to go out and take a walk, she had her reward. Mrs. Candy gave permission.

"Won't you come too, Maria?" she asked, when they went to their own room.

"There's no fun in walking," Maria answered, disconsolately.

"I am going to Lilac Lane."

"I hope you don't think there is any fun in that."

"But, Maria! – "

"Well, what?"

"I think there is something a great deal better than fun."

"You may have it all then, for me."

"Maria," said her little sister, gently, "I wish you wouldn't mind. Mamma will get well by and by, and this will be all over; and we are getting along so nicely. Aunt Candy was quite pleased with the dinner."

"There's another dinner to get to-morrow," said Maria; "and I don't know what you mean by this being 'all over' when mamma gets well. What difference will her getting well make? She will help, to be sure; but we should have the same things to do – just the same."

Matilda had not reckoned on that, for she looked sober a minute or two.

"Well, Maria," she said then, clearing up, "I don't care. If Jesus has given us this to do, you know, I like to do it; because He has given it to us to do."

Maria turned away impatiently.

"Maria," said her little sister, drawing nearer and speaking solemnly, "do you intend to ask Mr. Richmond to baptize you the next time he has the baptismal service?"

"If I do," said Maria, "you need not trouble yourself about it."

And Matilda thought she had better let the subject and her sister both alone for the present. She had got herself ready, and now taking her Bible she went out. It was but a little way to the corner. There she turned in the opposite direction from the one which would have taken her to church, and crossed the main street. In that direction, farther on, lay the way to Lilac Lane; but at the other corner of the street Matilda found an interruption. Somebody stopped her, whom she knew the next instant to be Norton Laval.

"Why, it is Matilda Englefield!" he said. "You are just the one I want to see."

"Am I?" said Matilda.

"I should think so. Come along; our house lies that way; don't you recollect?"

"Oh, but I am not going that way now," said Matilda.

"Oh yes, but you are! Mamma says contradicting is very rude, but I can't help it sometimes. Can you help it, Matilda?"

"People ought to be contradicted sometimes," Matilda said, with an arch bridling of her head, which, to be sure, the child was quite unconscious of.

"Not I," said Norton. "Come!"

"Oh, but I cannot, Norton. I wish I could. Not this time."

"Where are you going?"

"Up that way."

"Nobody lives up that way."

"Nobody? Just look at the houses."

"Nobody lives in those houses," said Norton.

"Oh, very well; then I am going to see nobody."

"No, Matilda; you are coming to see mamma. And I have something to show you; a new beautiful game, which mamma has got for me; we are going to play it on the lawn, when the grass is in order, by and by; and I want you to come and see it now, and learn how to play. Come, Matilda, I want to show it to you."

Matilda hesitated. It did not seem very easy to get rid of Norton; but what would become of the poor people in Lilac Lane? Would another time do for them? Here was Norton waiting for her; and a little play would be so pleasant. As she stood irresolute, Norton, putting his arm round her affectionately, and applying a little good-humoured force, gave her shoulders without much difficulty the turn he wished them to take. The two began to move down the street towards Norton's home. But as soon as this was done, Matilda began to have qualms about her dress. Norton was in a brown suit that fitted him, fresh and handsome; his cap sat jauntily on his thick, wavy hair; he was nice from head to foot. And Matilda had come out in the home dress she had worn while she and Maria had been washing up the dinner dittoes. Looking down she could see a little wet spot on the skirt now. That would dry. But then her boots were her everyday boots, and they were a little rusty; and she had on her common school hat. The only thing new and bright about her was her Bible under her arm. As her eye fell upon it, so did her companion's eye.

"What book have you got there?" he asked, and then put out his hand to take it. "A Bible! Where were you going with this, Matilda?"

"It is my Bible," said the little girl.

"Yes; but you do not take your Bible out to walk with you, do you, as babies do their dolls?"

"Of course not."

"Then what for, Matilda?"

"Business."

"What sort of business?"

"Why do you want to know, Norton? It was private business."

"I like that," said Norton. "Why do I want to know? Because you are Matilda Englefield, and I like to know all about you."

"You do not know much yet," said Matilda, looking with a pleased look, however, up into her companion's face. It was smiling at her, with a complacent look to match.

"I shan't know much when I know all," he said. "How old are you? You can't make much history in ten years."

"No, not much," said Matilda. "But still – it may not be history to other people, but I think it is to one's self."

"What?"

"Oh, one's life, you know."

"But ten years is not a life," said Norton.

"It is, if one hasn't lived any longer."

"I would like my life to be history to other people," said Norton. "Something worth while."

"I wouldn't like other people to know my life, though," said Matilda.

"Then could not help it, if it was something worth while," said Norton.

"Why, yes, Norton; one's life is what one thinks and feels; what nobody knows. Not the things that everybody knows."

"It is what one does," said Norton; "and if you do anything worth while, people will know it. I wonder what there will be to tell of you and me fifty years from now?"

"Fifty years! Why, then I should be sixty-one," said Matilda; "and you would be a good deal more than that. But perhaps we shall not live to be so old."

"Yes, we shall," said Norton. "I shall; and you must, too."

"Why, Norton, we can't make ourselves live," said Matilda, in great astonishment at this language.

"We shall live to be old, though," said Norton. "I know it. And I wish there may be something to be said of me. I don't think women ought to be talked of."

"I do not see what good it would do anybody to be talked of, after he has gone away out of the world," said Matilda. "Except to be talked of in heaven. That would be good."

"In heaven!" said Norton. "Talked of in heaven! Where did you get that?"

"I don't mean that exactly," said Matilda. "But some people will."

"Who?"

"Why, a great many people, Norton. Abraham and Noah, and David, and Daniel, and the woman that put all she had into the Lord's treasury, and the woman that anointed the head of Jesus – the woman who, He said, had done what she could. I would like to have that said of me, if it was Jesus that said it."

Norton took hold of Matilda and gave her a little good-humoured shake. "Stop that!" he said; "and tell me, is that why you are carrying a Bible out here in the streets?"

"Oh, I haven't any use for it here, Norton."

"Then what have you got it here for?"

"Norton, there are some people in the village who are sick, or cannot read; and I was going to read to them."

"Where are they?"

"In Lilac Lane."

"Where is that?"

"You go up past the corner a good way, and just by Mr. Barth's foundry you turn down a few steps, and turn again at the baker's. Then, a little way further on, you strike into the lane."

"That's it, is it? I know. But do you know what sort of people live up that way?"

"Yes."

"Well, there's another thing you don't know, and that's the mud. You'd never have got out again, if you had gone to Lilac Lane to-day. It is three feet deep; and it weighs twenty pounds a foot. After you set your shoe in it, you want a windlass to get it out again."

"What is a windlass?" Matilda asked.

"Don't you know? Well, you are a girl; but you are a brick. I'll teach you about a windlass, and lots of things."

"I shouldn't think you would want to teach me, because I am a girl," said Matilda.

They had reached the iron gate of Mrs. Laval's domain, walking fast as they had talked; and in answer to Matilda's last remark, Norton opened the gate for her, and took off his cap with an air as he held it for her to pass in. Matilda looked, smiled, and stepped past him.

"You are not like any boy I ever saw," she remarked, when he had recovered his cap and his place beside her.

"I hope you like me better than any one you ever saw?"

"Yes," said Matilda, "I do."

The boy's answer was to do what most boys are too shy or too proud for. He put his arms round Matilda and gave her a hearty kiss. Matilda was greatly surprised, and bridled a little, as if she thought Norton had taken a liberty; but on the whole seemed to recognise the fact that they were very good friends, and took this as a seal of it. Norton led her into the house, got his croquet box, and brought her and it out again to the little lawn before the door. Nobody else was visible. The day was still, dry, and sunny, and though the grass was hardly green yet and not shaven nor rolled nor anything that a croquet lawn ought to be, still it would do, as Norton said, to look at. Matilda stood by and listened intently, while he planted his hoops and showed his mallets, and explained to her the initial mysteries of the game. They even tried how it would go; and there was no doubt of one thing, the time went almost as fast as the croquet balls.

"I must run home, Norton," Matilda said at last.

"Why? I don't think so."

"I know I must."

"Well, do you like it?" He meant the game.

"Oh, it's delightful!" was Matilda's honest exclamation. Norton pushed back his cap and looked at her, pleased on his part. It came into Matilda's head that she ought to tell him something. Their two faces had grown to be so friendly to each other.

"Norton," she said, gravely, "I want you to know something about me."

"Yes," said Norton. "I want to know it."

"You don't know what it is."

"That's the very thing. I want to know it."

"Norton, did you ever see anybody baptized?"

"Babies," said Norton, after a moment's recollection.

"Well, if you would like to see me baptized, come to our church Sunday after next."

"You?" said Norton. "Haven't you been baptized?"

"Not yet."

"I thought everybody was. Then if you have not been yet, why do you? Whose notion is that?"

"It is mine."

"Your notion?" said Norton, examining her. "What do you mean by that, Matilda?"

"I mean, I want to be baptized; and Mr. Richmond is going to do it for me."

"What's it for? what's the use? I wouldn't if I were you."

"It is joining the church. Don't you understand, Norton?"

"Not a bit. That is something I never did understand. Do you understand it?"

"Why, yes, certainly."

"Let's hear, then," said Norton, putting up his croquet balls.

"Mr. Richmond has explained it so much, you know, I couldn't help but understand."

"Oh, it's Mr. Richmond, is it?"

"No; it's the Bible."

"Let's hear, then," said Norton. "Go on."

Matilda hesitated. She found a difficulty in saying all her mind to him; she did not know whether it was best; and with that she had a suspicion that perhaps she ought to do it. She glanced at him, and looked away, and glanced again; and tried to make up her mind. Norton was busy putting up his croquet hoops and mallets; but his face looked so energetic and wide awake, and his eye was so quick and strong, that she was half afraid to say something that might bring an expression of doubt or ridicule upon it. Then Norton looked up at her again, a keen look enough, but so full of pleasure in her that Matilda's doubts were resolved. He would not be unkind; she would venture it.

"I want you to know about me, Norton," she began again.

"Well," said Norton, "so do I; but it seems difficult, somehow."

"You do not think that, for you are laughing."

Norton gave her another look, laughing rather more; and then he came and stood close beside her.

"What is it, Matilda?" he asked.

"I don't want you to think that I am good," she said, looking up earnestly and timidly, "for I am not; but I want to be; and being baptized is a sign of belonging to the Lord Jesus, so I want to be baptized."

"It isn't a sign of anything good," said Norton. "Lots of people are baptized, that aren't anything else, I know. Lots of them, Matilda. That don't change them."

"No, that don't change them, Norton; but when they are changed, then the Bible says they must be baptized."

"What for?"

"It is just telling everybody what they believe, and what they are. It's a sign."

"Then when you are baptized, as you mean to be, that will be telling everybody what you believe and what you are?"

"Yes."

"It would not tell me," said Norton, "be-cause I should not understand the sign. I wish you would tell me now in words, Matilda."

"I don't know if I can, but I'll try. You know water makes things clean, Norton?"

"Sometimes."

"Well, if it is used it does," said Matilda. "The water is a sign that I believe the Lord Jesus will take away my sins, and make me clean and good, if I trust Him; that He will wash my heart, and that He has begun to do it. And it will be a sign that I am His servant, because that is what He has commanded His servants."

"What?"

"That; to be baptized, and join the church."

"Matilda, a great many people are baptized, and keep all their sins just the same."

"Oh, but those are make-believe people."

"No, they are not; they are real people."

"I mean, they are make-believe Christians."

"How do you know but you are?"

"I think I know," said Matilda, looking down.

"But other people won't know. Your being baptized will not mean anything to them, only that somebody has coaxed you into it."

"It will mean all that, Norton; and if I am true they will see it means all that."

"They might see it all the same without your being baptized. What difference would that make?"

"It is obedience," said Matilda, firmly. "And not to do it would be disobedience. And it is profession of faith; and not to do it, would be to say that I don't believe."

Norton looked amused, and pleased, and a little puzzled.

"You have not told me anything about you, after all," he said; "for I knew it all before."

"How did you know it?"

"Not this about your being baptized, you know, but about you."

"What about me?"

"I say, Matilda, when will you come and play croquet again?"

"I don't know. But, O Norton, I must go now. I forgot all about it. And there was something else I wanted to say. I wish you would be a servant of Jesus too?"

Matilda gave this utterance a little timidly. But Norton only looked at her and smiled, and finally closed the question by taking her in his arms and giving her two kisses this time. It was done without a bit of shamefacedness on his part, and with the energy and the tenderness too of affection. Matilda was extremely astonished and somewhat discomposed; but the evident kindness excused the freedom, and on the whole she found nothing to object. Norton opened the iron gate for her, and she hurried off homewards without another word.

In a dream of pleasure she hurried along, feeling that Norton Laval was a great gain to her, and that croquet was the most delightful of amusements, and that all the weariness of the day's work was taken out of her heart. She only regretted, as she went, that those poor people in Lilac Lane had heard no reading; but she resolved she would go to them to-morrow.

There is one time, however, for doing everything that ought to be done; and if that time is lost, no human calculation can make sure a second opportunity. Matilda was to find this in the case of Lilac Lane. The next day weather kept her at home. The second day she was too busy to go on such an expedition. The third was Sunday. And when Monday came, all thoughts of what she had intended to do were put out of her head by her mother's condition. Mrs. Englefield was declared to be seriously ill.

The doctor was summoned. Her fever had taken a bad turn, he said. It was a very bad turn; for after a few days it was found to be carrying her swiftly to death's door. She was unable to see her children, or at least unable to recognise and speak to them, until the very last day; and then too feeble. And the Sunday when Matilda had expected to be baptized, saw her mother's funeral instead.

Anne and Letitia came up from New York, but were obliged to return thither immediately after the funeral; and the two younger girls were left to their grief. It was well for them now that they, had plenty of business, plenty of active work on hand. It was a help to Maria; after a little it diverted her thoughts and took her out of the strain of sorrow. And it was a help to Matilda, but in a more negative way. It kept the child from grieving herself ill, or doing herself a mischief with violent sorrow; it was no relief. In every unoccupied moment, whenever the demands of household business left her free to do what she would, the little girl bent beneath her burden of sorrow. Kneeling before her open Bible, her tears flowed incessantly every moment when the luxury of indulgence could be allowed them. Mrs. Candy did not see the whole of this; she was rarely in the girls' room; yet she saw enough to become uneasy, and tried all that she knew to remedy it. Clarissa was kind, to her utmost power of kindness. Even Maria was stirred to try some soothing for her little sister. But Matilda could not be soothed. Maria's instances and persuasions did, however, at last urge her to the point of showing a part of her thoughts and disclosing the thorn that pressed sharpest on her mind. It was, that she had not pleased her mother by doing her best in the studies she had pursued at school. Matilda had always been a little self-indulgent; did not trouble herself with study; made no effort to reach or keep a good place in her classes. Mrs. Englefield had urged and commanded her in vain. Not obstinately, but with a sort of gay carelessness, Matilda had let these exhortations slip; had studied when she was interested, and lagged behind her companions in the pursuits she found dry. And now, she could not forgive herself nor cease her sorrowing on account of this failure.

Maria in despair at last took Mrs. Candy into her confidence, and besought her to comfort Matilda, which Mrs. Candy tried her best to do. She represented that Matilda had always been a good child; had loved and honoured her mother, and constantly enjoyed her favour. Matilda heard, but answered with sobs.

"I am sure, my dear," her aunt said, "you have nothing to reproach yourself with. We are none of us perfect."

"I didn't do what I could, aunt Candy!" was Matilda's answer.

"My dear, hardly anybody – the best of us – does all he might do."

"I will," said Matilda.