upshot on’t would be that somebody would be put up to suggestin’ that the money should go for a life-membership in the society for Miss Jaynes, says I; and I don’t like to encourage anybody in goin’ round beggin’ for money to buy her own promotion to a high seat in the synagogue.’—‘You ought to seen Miss Jaynes’s face then! It was redder’n any beet, for I’d hit the nail square on the head, as it happened, and the ladies could scurcely keep from smilin’.—‘Then,’ says I, ‘I shouldn’t be my father’s daughter, if I’d give a cent for a preacher that isn’t smart enough to get his own livin’ and pay for his own clothes and eddication. To ask poor women to pay for an able-bodied man’s expenses,’ says I, ‘seems to me like turnin’ the thing wrong end foremost. A young feller that a’n’t smart enough to find himself in victuals and clothes won’t be of much help in the Lord’s vineyard,’ says I.”
“And what did Mrs. Jaynes say?” asked little Helen, when Tira finally came to a pause.
“Well, really, my dear,” replied Miss Blake, “the woman had nothin’ to say, and so she said it. When I got through my speech I handed the five-dollar goldpiece to your Aunt Eunice, to send to the Asylum, and that ended it; for just then Dinah come in and said tea was ready, and we all went out. It was rather stiff for a while, and after tea we all went home; and for three long years Miss Jaynes never opened her face to me, until I came here to live, this time. Now she finds its for her interest to make up, and so she tries to be as good as pie. But though I mean to be civil, I’m no hypocrite, and I can’t be all honey and cream to them I don’t like; and besides, it a’n’t right to be.”
“But you ought not to blame Laura because her sister affronted you,” said Helen.
“I know that, my dear,” replied Miss Blake; “and if I’ve hurt the girl’s feelin’s, I’m sorry for’t. She’s tried hard to be friends with me, but I’ve pushed her off; for, not bein’ much acquainted, I was jealous, at first, that Miss Jaynes had put her up to it, to try to get round me in some way.”
“Never!” cried Cornelia,—“my Laura is incapable of such baseness!”
“Well,” said Statira, smiling, “come to know her, I guess you can’t find much guile in her, that’s a fact. If I did her wrong by mistrustin’ her without cause, I’ll try to make amends. It a’n’t in me to speak hash even to a dog, if the critter looks up into my face and wags his tail in honest good-nater. And I’ll say this for Laura Stebbins, anyhow, if she is Miss Jaynes’s sister,—she’s got the most takin’ ways of most any grown-up person I ever see.”
The reflection is painful to a generous mind, that, by harboring unjust suspicions of another, one has been led to repel friendly advances with indifference or disdain. In order to assuage some remorseful pangs, Miss Blake began from this tune to treat Laura with distinguished favor. On the other hand, Laura, delighted at this pleasant change in Miss Blake’s demeanor, sought frequent opportunities of testifying her joy and gratitude. In this manner an intimacy began, which ripened at length into a firm and enduring friendship. Laura soon commenced the practice of applying to her more experienced friend for advice and direction in almost every matter, great or small, and of confiding to her trust divers secrets and confessions which she would never have ventured to repose even in Cornelia’s faithful bosom. This prudent habit Tira encouraged.
“I know, my dear,” said she, one day, “I know what it is to be almost alone in the world, and what a comfort it is to have somebody you can rely on to tell your griefs and troubles to, and, as it were, get ’em to help you bear ’em. So, my dear child, whenever you want to get my notions on any point, just come right straight to me, if you feel like it. I may not be able to give you the best advice, for I a’n’t so wise as you seem to think I be; however I ha’n’t lived nigh fifty years in the world for naught, I trust,
