Christie Redfern's Troubles Part 10

But Christie's lips could utter no sound. John Nesbitt began, "The Lord's my Shepherd;" and in a little time several trembling voices joined. When they came to the verse:

"Yea, though I walk through Death's dark vale, Yet will I fear no ill; For Thou art with me, and Thy rod And staff me comfort still,--"

they rose full, clear, and triumphant. They were the last sounds he heard on earth. When they ended, Mrs Nesbitt's hand was gently laid on their father's eyelids, and at the sight of that the children knew they were orphans.

CHAPTER FIVE.

CLOUDS AND SUNs.h.i.+NE.

When a great sorrow has just fallen upon us, we find it impossible to feel that all things about us are not changed. We cannot imagine ourselves falling into the old daily routine again. The death of one dear to us gives us a shock which seems to unsettle the very foundation of things. A sense of insecurity and unreality pervades all that concerns us. We shrink from the thought that the old pleasures will charm us again, that daily cares will occupy our minds to the exclusion of to-day's sadness, that time will heal the wounds that smart so bitterly now.

But it does; and as it pa.s.ses, we find ourselves going the old rounds, enjoying the old pleasures, doing the duties which the day brings; and the great healer does his kindly office, to the soothing of our pain.

It is not that our bereavement is no longer felt, or that we have forgotten the friend we loved. But the human heart is a harp with many strings. Though one be broken, there are others which answer to the touch of the wandering breezes; and though the music may be marred in some of its measures, it is still sweet.

The young cannot long sit under the shadow of a great sorrow, if there be any chance rays of suns.h.i.+ne gleaming. Besides, the poor have no time to sit down and nurse their grief. When little more than a week had pa.s.sed after Mr Redfern's death, Effie was obliged to return to the ruling and guiding of her noisy little kingdom. She went sadly enough; and many an anxious thought went back to the household at home. But she could not choose but go. They had agreed among themselves that there should be no change till after the harvest should be gathered in, and in the meantime, all the help that she could give was needed. Her monthly wages were growing doubly precious in her estimation. They were the chief dependence at home.

The sowing and planting had been on a limited scale this spring, and all outdoor matters, except what pertained to the dairy, could very well be attended to by James Cairns, their hired man, who was strong and willing. So Annie and Sarah were in the house, and the little ones went to school as soon as the summer weather came.

As for Christie, little was expected from her besides attending to Aunt Elsie, and reading to her now and then. These were easy enough duties, one would think, considering how little attention Aunt Elsie was willing to accept from any one. But light as they were, Christie could not hide, and did not always _try_ to hide, the truth that they were irksome to her.

Poor little Christie! How miserable she was, often! How mortified and ashamed of herself! This was all so different from what she had meant to be when Effie went away--a help and a comfort to all. There were times when she strove bravely with herself: she strove to be less peevish, and to join the rest in their efforts to be useful and cheerful; but she almost always failed, and every new failure left her less able and less willing to try again.

But Christie was not so much to blame for these shortcomings as she had sometimes been. The great reaction from the efforts and anxieties before her father's death, as well as the shock of that event, left her neither strength nor power to exert herself or to interest herself in what was pa.s.sing. Her sisters meant kindly in claiming no help about the household work from her, but they made a mistake in so doing.

Active work, that would have really tired her, and left her no time for melancholy musings, would have been far better for her. As it was, she could apply herself to no employment, not even her favourite reading.

Her time, when not immediately under her aunt's eye, was pa.s.sed in listless wanderings to and fro, or in sitting with folded hands, thinking thoughts that were unprofitable always, and sometimes wrong.

Fits of silence alternated with sudden and violent bursts of weeping, which her sisters could neither soothe nor understand. Indeed, she did not understand them herself. She struggled with them, ashamed of her folly and weakness; but she grew no better, but rather worse.

She might well rejoice when, at the end of a fortnight, Effie came home.

The wise and loving elder sister was not long in discovering that the peevishness and listlessness of her young sister sprang from a cause beyond her control. She was ill from over-exertion, and nervous from over-excitement and grief. Nothing could be worse for her than this confinement to Aunt Elsie's sick-room, added to the querulousness of Aunt Elsie herself.

"You should let Christie help with the milking, as she used to do," she said to Sarah. "It would be far better for her than sitting so much in Aunt Elsie's room. She seems ill and out of sorts."

"Yes, she's out of sorts," said Sarah, with less of sympathy in her tone than Effie had shown. "There's no telling what to do with her sometimes. She can scarcely bear a word, but bursts out crying if the least thing is said to her. I dare say she is not very well, poor child!"

"She seems far from well, indeed," said Effie, gravely. "And I'm sure you, or I either, would find our spirits sink if we were to spend day after day in Aunt Elsie's room. You don't know what it is till you try it."

Sarah shrugged her shoulders.

"I dare say we should. But Christie doesna seem to mind much what Aunt Elsie says. I'm sure I thought she liked better to be there than to be working hard in the kitchen or dairy."

"She may like it better, but it's no' so good for her, for all that.

You should send her out, and try and cheer her up, poor la.s.sie! She's no' so strong as the rest of us; and she suffers much from the shock."

That night, when the time for bringing home the cows came, Effie took her sun-bonnet from the nail, saying carelessly:

"I'm going to the pasture. Are you coming, Christie?"

"For the cows?" said Christie, tartly. "The bairns go for them."

"Oh, but I'm going for the pleasure of the walk. We'll go through the wheat, and down by the brook. Come."

Christie would far rather have stayed quietly at home, but she did not like to refuse Effie; and so she went, and was better for it. At first Effie spoke of various things which interested them as a family; and Christie found herself listening with pleasure to all her plans. At the side of the brook, where they sat down for a while, as they usually did, they spoke of their father and mother; and though Christie wept, it was not that nervous weeping which sometimes so exhausted her. She wept gently; and when Effie spoke of the love that should bind them all closely together, now that they were orphans, she prayed inwardly that G.o.d would make her more patient and loving than she had lately been.

Her heart was lighter than it had been for days, when they rose to go.

They went to the kirk together the next day too. They did not walk; so there was no lingering in the kirk-yard or at the half-mile corner. But the day was fine and the air pleasant; and the motion of the great wagon in which they drove, though not very easy, was agreeable for a change, and Christie enjoyed it all. I am afraid she did not enjoy the sermon better than usual. She had a great many wandering thoughts, and she had to struggle against overpowering drowsiness, which she did not quite succeed in casting off. But she enjoyed the kind greetings and looks of sympathy that awaited them in the kirk-yard, though they brought many tears to Effie's eyes, and sent them gus.h.i.+ng over her own pale cheeks.

She was glad of old Mrs Grey's sweet, cheerful words, and of the light pressure of blind Allie's little hand. She was glad when she heard Mrs Nesbitt ask Effie to bring her sister over to pa.s.s a week with her, and more glad still when Effie made the promise, saying the change would do her good. Altogether, the day was a pleasant one, and Christie went home better and more cheerful than she had been since her father's death.

But before the week was over she had fallen back into the old way again; and when Effie came home on Sat.u.r.day, she found her as wan and listless and peevish as ever. Something must be done without delay, thought the elder sister. So, that night, as she sat with Annie and Sarah in her aunt's room, when all the little ones had gone to bed, she said:

"Aunt Elsie, I am going to take Christie back with me, to stay a week with Mrs Nesbitt."

Aunt Elsie looked astonished and somewhat displeased.

"Why should you do the like of that?" she asked.

"Oh, just for a change. She's not very well, I think, and a little change will do her good."

"Folk canna ay get changes when they would like them," said Aunt Elsie, coldly. "I see nothing more than usual the matter with her. If she's no' well, home's the best place for her. I see no cause why Mrs Nesbitt should be troubled with the likes of her."

"Oh, Mrs Nesbitt winna think it a trouble. Christie will be no trouble to her. I know she canna well be spared. You'll miss her; but she'll be all the better a nurse when she comes home strong and cheerful."

"I beg you winna think about me in making your plans for pleasuring,"

said her aunt, in a tone which always made those who heard it uncomfortable. "I'll try and do without her services for a while. She thinks much of herself; and so do you, it seems."

There was an unpleasant pause, during which Effie congratulated herself on the forethought that had sent Christie safely to bed before the matter was discussed. Annie, as she generally did in similar circ.u.mstances, started another subject, hoping to avert anything more unpleasant. But Effie wanted the matter decided, and Aunt Elsie had something more to say.

"It's my belief you mean to spoil the la.s.sie, if she's no spoiled already, petting and making a work with her as though she were really ill. Ill! It's little any of you ken what it is to be ill."

"I don't think she's very ill," said Effie, gently; "but she's nervous and weary and out of sorts, and I think maybe a change--"

"Nervous!" repeated Aunt Elsie, contemptuously. "It was better days when there was less said about nerves than I am in the way of hearing now. Let a bairn be cross, or sulky, and, oh! it's nervous she is, poor thing! Let her have a change. I know not, for my part, what the world is coming to. Nervous, indeed!"

"I didna mean to excuse Christie's peevishness--far from it," said Effie. "I know you have not a cheerful companion in her. But I do think she is not well; and as Mrs Nesbitt asked her, I thought perhaps you wouldna mind letting her go for a while."

"It matters little what I may think on that or any other subject," said Aunt Elsie, in a tone which betrayed that anger was giving place to sadness. "Helpless as I am, and burdensome, I should take what consideration I can get, and be thankful. I needna expect that my wishes will govern any of you."

This was very unjust, and the best way to make her feel that it was so was to keep silence; and not a word was said in reply. In a little time she said, again--

"I dinna see how you can think of taking the child away anywhere, and a printed calico all that she has in the way of mourning, and her father not buried a month yet."

"It would matter very little at Mrs Nesbitt's," said Effie, congratulating herself on her aunt's softening tone, but not seeming to notice it.

"Times are sorely changed with us, when the price of a gown more or less is felt as it is," said Aunt Elsie, with a sigh. "I have seen the day--" And she wandered off to other matters. Effie chose to consider the affair of Christie's going settled. And so it was. No further objection was made; and they went together the next afternoon.

If Effie could have chosen among all the pleasant homes of Glengarry, she could have found no better place for her young sister than Mrs Nesbitt's. It was quiet and cheerful at the same time. Christie could pursue her own occupations, and go her own way, no one interfering with her, so long as her way was the right way and her occupation such as would do her no injury. But there were no listless wanderings to and fro, no idle musings, permitted here. No foolish reading was possible.

If a shadow began to gather on the child's brow, her attention was claimed immediately, either by Jean, the merry maid-of-all-work, or by Mrs Nesbitt herself. There were chickens to feed, or vegetables to be gathered, or the lambs were to be counted, or some other good reason was found why she should betake herself to the fresh air and the pleasant fields or the garden.