"But you can"t, child! The wind might blow the snuff of your candle right into something that would be all a flame by the time you"re asleep. You must manage without a light somehow."
"But I can"t see to find my way," said Nettie, who was secretly trembling with fear.
"I"ll light you then, for once, and you"ll soon learn the way. Give me the candle."
Nettie hushed the words that came crowding into her mouth, and clambered up the steep stairs to the attic. Mrs. Mathieson followed her with the candle till she got to the top, and there she held it till Nettie had found her way to the other end where her bed was. Then she said good-night and went down.
The little square shutter of the window was open, and a ray of moonlight streamed in upon the bed. It was nicely made up; Nettie saw that her mother had been there and had done that for her and wrought a little more s.p.a.ce and order among the things around the bed. But the moonlight did not get in far enough to show much more. Just a little of this thing and of that could be seen; a corner of a chest, or a gleam on the side of a meal bag; the half light showed nothing clearly except the confused fulness of the little attic. Nettie had given her head a blow against a piece of timber as she came through it; and she sat down upon her little bed, feeling rather miserable. Her fear was that the rats might visit her up there. She did not certainly know that there were rats in the attic, but she had been fearing to think of them and did not dare to ask; as well as unwilling to give trouble to her mother; for if they _did_ come there, Nettie did not see how the matter could be mended. She sat down on her little bed, so much frightened that she forgot how tired she was. Her ears were as sharp as needles, listening to hear the sc.r.a.pe of a rat"s tooth upon a timber or the patter of his feet over the floor.
For a few minutes Nettie almost thought she could not sleep up there alone, and must go down and implore her mother to let her spread her bed in a corner of her room. But what a bustle that would make. Her mother would be troubled, and her father would be angry, and the lodger would be disturbed, and there was no telling how much harm would come of it.
No; the peacemaker of the family must not do that. And then the words floated into Nettie"s mind again, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of G.o.d." Like a strain of the sweetest music it floated in; and if an angel had come and brought the words straight to Nettie, she could not have been more comforted. She felt the rats could not hurt her while she was within hearing of that music; and she got up and kneeled down upon the chest under the little window and looked out.
It was like the day that had pa.s.sed; not like the evening. So purely and softly the moonbeams lay on all the fields and trees and hills, there was no sign of anything but peace and purity to be seen. No noise of men"s work or voices; no clangour of the iron foundry which on weekdays might be heard; no sight of anything unlovely; but the wide beauty which G.o.d had made, and the still peace and light which he had spread over it.
Every little flapping leaf seemed to Nettie to tell of its Maker; and the music of those words seemed to be all through the still air--"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of G.o.d." Tears of gladness and hope slowly gathered in Nettie"s eyes.
The children of G.o.d will enter in, by and by, through those pearly gates, into that city of gold,--"where they need no candle, neither light of the sun, for the Lord G.o.d giveth them light." "So he can give me light here--or what"s better than light," thought Nettie. "G.o.d isn"t only out there, in all that beautiful moonlight world--he is here in my poor little attic too; and he will take just as good care of me as he does of the birds, and better, for I am his child, and they are only his beautiful little servants."
Nettie"s fear was gone. She prayed her evening prayer; she trusted herself to the Lord Jesus to take care of her; and then she undressed herself and lay down and went to sleep, just as quietly as any sparrow of them all with its head under its wing.
CHAPTER III.
NETTIE"S GARRET.
Nettie"s attic grew to be a good place to her. She never heard the least sound of rats; and it was so nicely out of the way. Barry never came up there, and there she could not even hear the voices of her father and Mr. Lumber. She had a tired time of it down stairs.
That first afternoon was a good specimen of the way things went on.
Nettie"s mornings were always spent at school; Mrs. Mathieson would have that, as she said, whether she could get along without Nettie or no.
From the time Nettie got home till she went to bed, she was as busy as she could be. There was so much bread to make, and so much beef and pork to boil, and so much washing of pots and kettles; and at meal times there were very often cakes to fry, besides all the other preparations.
Mr. Mathieson seemed to have made up his mind that his lodger"s rent should all go to the table and be eaten up immediately; but the difficulty was to make as much as he expected of it in that line; for now he brought none of his own earnings home, and Mrs. Mathieson had more than a sad guess where they went. By degrees he came to be very little at home in the evenings, and he carried off Barry with him.
Nettie saw her mother burdened with a great outward and inward care at once, and stood in the breach all she could. She worked to the extent of her strength, and beyond it, in the endless getting and clearing away of meals; and watching every chance, when the men were out of the way, she would coax her mother to sit down and read a chapter in her Testament.
"It will rest you so, mother," Nettie would say; "and I will make the bread just as soon as I get the dishes done. Do let me! I like to do it."
Sometimes Mrs. Mathieson could not be persuaded; sometimes she would yield, in a despondent kind of way, and sit down with her Testament and look at it as if neither there nor anywhere else in the universe could she find rest or comfort any more.
"It don"t signify, child," she said, one afternoon when Nettie had been urging her to sit down and read. "I haven"t the heart to do anything.
We"re all driving to rack and ruin just as fast as we can go."
"Oh no, mother!" said Nettie. "I don"t think we are."
"I am sure of it. I see it coming every day. Every day it is a little worse; and Barry is going along with your father; and they are destroying me among them, body and soul too."
"No, mother," said Nettie, "I don"t think that. I have prayed the Lord Jesus, and you know he has promised to hear prayer; and I know we are not going to ruin."
"_You_ are not, child, I believe; but you are the only one of us that isn"t. I wish I was dead, to be out of my misery!"
"Sit down, mother, and read a little bit; and don"t talk so. Do, mother!
It will be an hour and more yet to supper, and I"ll get it ready. You sit down and read, and I"ll make the shortcakes. Do, mother! and you"ll feel better."
It was half despair and half persuasion that made her do it; but Mrs.
Mathieson did sit down by the open window and take her Testament; and Nettie flew quietly about, making her shortcakes and making up the fire and setting the table, and through it all casting many a loving glance over to the open book in her mother"s hand and the weary, stony face that was bent over it. Nettie had not said how her own back was aching, and she forgot it almost in her business and her thoughts; though by the time her work was done her head was aching wearily too. But cakes and table and fire and everything else were in readiness; and Nettie stole up behind her mother and leaned over her shoulder; leaned a little heavily.
[1] "Don"t that chapter comfort you, mother?" she whispered.
[1] See Frontispiece.
"No. It don"t seem to me as I"ve got any feeling left," said Mrs.
Mathieson. It was the fourth chapter of John at which they were both looking.
"Don"t it comfort you to read of Jesus being wearied?" Nettie went on, her head lying on her mother"s shoulder.
"Why should it, child?"
"I like to read it," said Nettie. "Then I know he knows how I feel sometimes."
"G.o.d knows everything, Nettie."
"Yes, mother; but then Jesus _felt_ it. "He took our infirmities." And oh, mother, don"t you love that tenth verse?--and the thirteenth and fourteenth?"
Mrs. Mathieson looked at it, silently; then she said, "I don"t rightly understand it, Nettie. I suppose I ought to do so,--but I don"t."
"Why, mother! I understand it. It means, that if Jesus makes you happy, you"ll never be unhappy again. "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him, _shall never thirst_,"--don"t you see, mother? "Shall never thirst,"--he will have enough, and be satisfied."
"How do you know it, Nettie?" her mother asked, in a puzzled kind of way.
"I know it, mother, because Jesus has given that living water to me."
"He never gave it to me," said Mrs. Mathieson, in the same tone.
"But he _will_, mother. Look up there--oh, how I love that tenth verse!--"If thou knewest the gift of G.o.d, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water." See, mother,--he will give, if we ask."
"And do you feel so, Nettie?--that you have enough, and are satisfied with your life every day?"
"Yes, mother," Nettie said, quietly; "I am very happy. I am happy all the time; because I think that Jesus is with me everywhere; when I"m upstairs, and when I"m busy here, and when I"m at school, and when I go to the spring; and all times. And that makes me very happy."
"And don"t you wish for anything you haven"t got?" said her mother.
"Yes, one thing," said Nettie. "I just wish that you and father and Barry may be so happy too; and I believe that"s coming; for I"ve prayed the Lord, and I believe he will give it to me. I want it for other people too. I often think, when I am looking at somebody, of those words--"If thou knewest the gift of G.o.d, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.""
With that, Mrs. Mathieson cast down her book and burst into such a pa.s.sion of weeping that Nettie was frightened. It was like the breaking up of an icy winter. She flung her ap.r.o.n over her head and sobbed aloud; till hearing the steps of the men upon the staircase she rushed off to Barry"s room, and presently got quiet, for she came out to supper as if nothing had happened.
From that time there was a gentler mood upon her mother, Nettie saw; though she looked weary and careworn as ever, there was not now often the hard, dogged look which had been wont to be there for months past.
Nettie had no difficulty to get her to read the Testament; and of all things, what she liked was to get a quiet hour of an evening alone with Nettie and hear her sing hymns. But both Nettie and she had a great deal, as Mrs. Mathieson said, "to put up with."
As weeks went on, the father of the family was more and more out at nights, and less and less agreeable when he was at home. He and his friend Lumber helped each other in mischief: they went together to Jackson"s shop and spent time in lounging and gossiping and talking politics there; and what was worse, they made the time and the politics go down with draughts of liquor. Less and less money came to Mrs.
Mathieson"s hand; but her husband always required what he called a good meal to be ready for him and his lodger whenever he came home, and made no difference in his expectations whether he had provided the means or not. The lodger"s rent and board had been at first given for the household daily expenses; but then Mr. Mathieson began to pay over a smaller sum, saying that it was all that was due; and Mrs. Mathieson suspected that the rest had been paid away already for brandy. Then Mr.