Bluff Crag | Page 8

Patrick. Poor Patrick! Aunt Mary has so often said he would need to get some severe lessons to make him think. She was always telling him that he would find out the path of transgressors is hard, instead of pleasant, as he seemed to fancy. I don't think there is such a miserable girl as I am in the world?' And here Vea began to cry.
"After comforting her as well as I could, she was at last prevailed upon to take a short walk along the beach in the direction where some children were playing. As we walked along I told her that my mother often said, when we fancied ourselves ill-used and very unhappy, if we looked about us we would generally find that there was somebody even more miserable than we were ourselves. By this time we had come up to the children, and found three of them in earnest conversation. We were not long in discovering that the youngest was in evident distress, and her companions were listening to her words with deep interest.
"'I wouldn't stand it, if I were you, Polly,' said the eldest girl, who was standing in front of the group.
"'But what can I do, Martha?' replied the girl, rocking herself to and fro, and weeping afresh.
"'Do? I would run away,' replied the other. 'I would go into service, or beg my bread from door to door, rather than bear what you have to bear.'
"'But don't you think you had better speak to teacher, Polly?' said the other girl softly, looking from under her sun-bonnet with great dreamy-looking blue eyes; 'I wouldn't do anything rash before speaking to teacher. You remember what she said to us last Sunday, that all our trials were sent from our Father in heaven.'
[Illustration: POOR POLLY.]
"'Yes, Rachel, I heard her say that,' replied Polly; 'and I try to think about it; but oh! my step-mother would make anybody angry; and then my temper rises, and I speak out, and then I am beaten. I wouldn't mind that, however, if she would only beat me; but when I see her raise her hand to strike little Willie, who never was angry in his life, but was always gentle and good--always, always.'
"'Is there anything I can do for you, little girl?' said Vea, stepping forward, forgetting for the time her own trouble while witnessing the distress of another. 'Why does your companion want you to run away?'
"'It's to escape from her step-mother, miss,' replied the girl called Martha. 'She uses her shameful, she do, and all for what? Because Polly's father made so much of her afore he was lost.'
"'And was your father lost at sea, Polly? Oh, how dreadful!' said Vea, seating herself on the stones beside her. 'And have you no mother of your own?'
"'No, miss; mother died when Willie was a year old,' said Polly.
"'And do you remember her quite well?' asked Vea.
"'Oh yes, quite well, miss. It was a terrible night that, just before she died. Father was away to the town for some tackle, and I was left all alone with her and Willie. She hadn't been very well for some weeks, but nobody thought she was going to die. Even the very doctor had said that morning so cheerily to father she would weather through. She had been lying sleeping with Willie in her arms, but a sudden squall shook the door, and made it and the window-frame rattle, and that startled her, and she wakened. Then I couldn't help seeing she was much worse; and I tried to keep from crying, for she seemed wild-like, and the doctor had said she was to be kept quiet. Then she looked up in a moment, and said, "Polly, promise me you'll look after Willie when I die. Never let any harm come to Willie, mind that; and take care of father, but look well after Willie." She never spoke again, not even to father, who came in soon after, and cried like a baby over her. She just opened her eyes once, and looked at him with a smile, and tried to push Willie over to him, and then she died. How good father was to us then! He used to take Willie down to the beach with him while I made the house tidy and got the dinner; and he made Willie a fine boat, and dug out a place for him to sail it in; and oh! but we were happy then!'
"'I don't think your father would have been lost if it hadn't been that step-mother of yours,' said Martha angrily. 'I can't a-bear her, I can't.'
"'Oh, don't say that, Martha. It was God who took father,' said Polly, in a low whisper. 'Didn't you hear the rector saying it was God's will to