would do no harm for her to try to get acquainted with him and help him, even if she never got a fortune to enable her to raise her neighbors into better things. She ‘would begin the reformation of young Mr. Knowles that very evening, if there came an opportunity. With these thoughts and plans in mind she completed her long walk in much shorter time than usual and with a lighter heart. It did her good to have an interest in life beyond the mere duties of the hour.
She found Mrs. Morris in much the same state of depression as on the day before. The doctor had urged again that she go to the hospital for regular course of treatment. She was as determined as ever that she would not, or rather could not do it. She wanted Celia to come and sit with her. She had taken a liking to her new boarder, and she did not hesitate to say so, and to declare that the others were an unfeeling set who bothered her and didn’t care if she was sick. Celia tried to cheer her up. She gave her a flower which one of the other workers in the store had given her, and told her she would come up after dinner was over. Then she went down to the table, and found Mr. Knowles seated before his plate looking cold and coughing. She wondered if her opportunity would come. His seat was at her left hand. They exchanged some remarks about the weather, and Celia told him he seemed to have a bad cold. He told her that was a chronic state with him, and then coughed again as he tried to laugh. She entered into his mock gaiety, and told him that if his mother were there she would tell him not to go out that evening, in such damp weather and with that cough.
His face grew sober instantly, and he said very earnestly: “I suppose she would.”
“Well, then, I suppose you’ll stay in, won’t you?” said the girl. “It isn’t right not to take care of yourself. The wind is very raw to-night. Your cough will be much worse to-morrow if you go out in it. You ought to stay in for your mother’s sake, you know.”
It was a bow drawn at a venture. Celia stole a glance at him. He looked up at her quickly, his handsome, gay face sober and almost startled.
“But mother isn’t here,” he said, his voice husky. “She died a year ago.”
“But don’t you think mothers care for their sons even after they have gone to heaven? I believe they do. I believe in some way God lets them know when they are doing right. You ought to take care of yourself just the same, even if she is not here, for, you know she would tell you to do it, now wouldn’t she?”
“Yes, I know she would,” he answered, and then, after a minute’s pause, he added, “but it is so hard to stay in here. There is no place to sit and nothing to do all the evening. Mother used to have things different.”
“It is hard,” said Celia, sympathizingly, “and this is a dreary place. I’ve thought so myself ever since I came. I wonder if you and I couldn’t make things a little pleasanter for us all, if we tried.”
“How? I’m sure I never thought I could do anything in that line. How would you go about it?”
“Well, I’m not just sure,” said Celia, thinking rapidly and bringing forth some of her half made plans to select one for this emergency. “But I think we ought to have a good light first. The gas is miserable.”
“You’re right; it is that,” responded Mr. Knowles.
“Didn’t I see a big lamp on the parlor table?”
“Yes, I think there is a lamp there, but it smokes like an engine, and it gives a wicked flare of a light that stares at you enough to put your eyes out.”
“Well, I wonder if we couldn’t do something to cure that lamp of smoking. I’m somewhat a doctor of lamps myself, having served a long apprenticeship at them, and I think if you’ll help me I’ll try. I have some lovely pink crepe paper upstairs that I got to make a shade for my room, but I’ll sacrifice that to the house if you can get me a new wick. What do you say? Shall we try it? I’m sure Mrs. Morris won’t object, for it will save gas, besides making things pleasanter for the boarders. I have a book I think you will enjoy, after the lamp is fixed for reading. If you are going to be a good boy and stay at home tonight I’ll bring it down.”
The young man entered into the scheme enthusiastically. He was a very young man, not more than nineteen, or Celia would not have cared or dared to speak to him in this half-commanding way. But she had been used to boys, and to winning them to do what she wished, and she won her way this time surely. The young man was only too glad to have something to keep him in, and his heart was still very tender toward his lost mother. Celia saw that he would not be hard to influence. She wished she were wise and able to help him. Her soul felt with oppression the need of all these other souls in this house with her, and she wished to be great and mighty to lift them up and help them. How strange it was that the way kept opening up before her for daily helping of others. She seemed to be the only Christian in this house full of people. What a weight of responsibility rested upon her if that was so. How she ought to pray to be guided that she might be wise as a serpent and harmless as a dove; that she might, if possible, bring each one of them to a knowledge of Jesus Christ. And what was she to do all this? A mere weak girl, who was discouraged and homesick, and could not get enough money together to keep herself from need, perhaps, nor grace enough to keep her own heart from failing or her feet from falling. What was she to think of guiding others? How could she do all this work? She must shrink back from the thought. She could not do it. It was too much. Ah! She might leave all that to her gracious Lord. She had forgotten that. All he wanted her to do was to take the duty of the hour or the minute and do it for him. What matter whether there were results that showed or not so long as he was obeyed? When she slipped up to her room for that pink crepe paper she knelt down and asked that it and the book and the lamp and her little effort for the evening might be blessed. Then she went down to conquer that lamp.
Chapter 5
“For the land sake! Yes,” said Mrs. Morris, turning wearily on her pillow, “do what you please with it. I wish it was a good one. I’d like to afford a real good one
with a silk shade with lace on it, but I can’t. There’s lots ought to be done here, but there’s no use talking about it. I’m clean discouraged anyway. I wish I could sell out, bag and baggage, and go to the poorhouse.”
“Oh, Mrs. Morris, don’t talk that way!” said Celia, brightly. “You’ll get well pretty soon. Don’t think about that now. We’ll try to keep things in order till you are able to see to them yourself. And meantime, I believe I can make that lamp work beautifully. I’ll come back by and by and report progress. Now eat that porridge. I know it can’t hurt you. The doctor told me it would be good for you. I made it myself, and it’s just such as aunt Hannah used to make for sick people. There’s nothing like twice boiled flour porridge. Is is seasoned right? There’s the salt.”
Then she flitted downstairs to the lamp.
Young Mr. Knowles was already on hand with the new wick he had purchased at the corner grocery, having carefully taken the measure of the burner.
Celia with experienced hand soon had the lamp burning brightly. Frank Hartley, the University student, had been attracted by the unusual light and declared he would bring his books down to the parlor for a while. It was cold as a barn in his room anyway. He and Harry Knowles stood by watching with admiring eyes, as Celia’s fingers, now washed from the oil of the lamp, manipulated the pretty rose-colored paper into a shade, and when it was done, with a gathering string, a smoothing out on the edges and a pucker and twist here and there, and then a band and bow of the crepe paper, it all had looked so simple that they
