CHARITY'S SECRET 207
the next fire they'll send their things where they'll be giv to the vartuous poor an’ not to them as plazes your fancy, mem. Good-evening, mem.” She turned to a woman beside her, and went on without lowering her tone, “She's young yet. She'll git more sense as she gits older. All the best things they kept, But them Brettlers is misabul trash. He's a quack doctor, I've heerd.”
The door shut behind them at last, George coming in, ran up to the sitting-room, and I followed with a heavy step. It was durk and cold; before I could ask what was the matter, Jane, the nurse, came in with a dismayed voice.
“Please, Mrs Brettler, them Clincy days Jet out the fire in the heater, and carried off the wraps from the metre, and the gas is dead froze, and they've made off with the spades; and as to the keg of butter——”
That was the last straw, I sat down in the dark, and, I am ashamed to say, cried bitterly.
I felt my husband's hand on wy head, stroking the hair very gently.
“It has been a hard week for you, poor Lou!”
“Yes, it has,” I broke out. “I never will try to do good again! I never want to hear of the ‘widows or the fatherless, if they are Irish! I don't wonder that charitable women get that look and manner as if they and the poor were machines together.”
George only said, “Let us have tea.” So we ate our supper by the flaring light of a tallow-candle, stuck in a bottle, for candlestick there was none.
As we went ont of the room, he said, “It is a little dismal here. Let us go for a walk.”
In spite of the cold I was glad of the chance of fresh air; ao I bathed my red eyes, put on wy cloak and bonnet, and we were soon out in a lonely street, the blue, dark sky overhead, with its glitter of eternal stars, and the frosty, exhilarating wind stirring our pulses,
I tried to put the misery of the world out of my head, as something with which I had no further work nor part, and to go back to my old cheerful self.
“Where are we going, George?” I said, as we stopped in front of one of the interminable rows of neat, cheap dwellings which form the suburbs of Philadelphia.
“I want you to see one of my patients,” he ssid, leading me straight up the staira. “She has the rooms on the second floor.”
He knocked at a door—an authoritative, doctor's knock—and went in. I followed him. The rooms were clean, but barely furnished, On a bed, near the door, lay an old woman, with one of the most reserved, honest, straightforward faces I ever had seen, The sandy bair was drawn back under her cap; her features bad that peculiar, pinched look, given by long, patient suffering, I did not need George's whisper to make me “be kind to her.”
“This is my wife, Mrs, Lennox. I would have brought her sooner to see you, but she has been occupied since I first came to you.”
She bowed gravely, holding out her hand,
“Your husband has been very kind to me, madam,”
He did not tell me that.”
“Then I must. I can live but a few years now, they tell me, and it is owing to him those years will be comfortable and happy. I have no fear of my girl's life, now.” She glanced as she said this to a young girl near the fire, who had been sewing, but now got up and stood looking at us,
I had no recollection of having seen her before; it was not until she came close, speaking, that I remembered the girl whom I had driven from the door on Tuesday-night. Now that her dress was exchanged for a plain, dark calico, her skin clean, and her fair hair smoothly brushed back, she was a homely, attractive- looking girl, with her mother’s peculiar honorable, undaunted look on her face,
My husband stooped over the bed to make some professional inquiries, and the girl moved slightly aside, beckoning me to her side.
“You remember me?”
“Yes, Margaret Lennox.”
“I wish that mother should not know of my visit to you. It is not long now, and I do not want her to know how near I was to——”
I held out my hand. “I wronged you that night. I am sorry——”
“No. You—— I would have been all you thought me, if God had not sent your husband to me. I was desperate, Mother had eaten nothing all day. I couldn't see her die before my eyes. Dr. Brettler tells me that if I had prayed, God would have heard me. I don't know. He takes care of us whether we remember him or not, I think.”
I could say nothing. The bitter gnawing of ineffectual effort was sharp at my heart.
It was very unjust,” I said, at last.
“I hardly remember. I would have done anything that night for money,” her eyes wandering. “I could not see her die, I could not get work. I went and lied to you. But I went out to get money, I would have had it, at any price—at any price.”
“Have you work now?” to turn her thoughts. �
