if there was any harm in innocent mirth!" exclaimed Mildred, "as if there was anybody in the world with so good a right to be glad and happy as one who knows that Jesus loves him! 'Rejoice in the Lord, ye righteous and shout for joy all ye that are upright in heart,' The Bible is full of commands to God's people to rejoice, to be glad, to sing for joy; and the best Christians I know seem to me the happiest people on earth."
"You're rather young to set up your judgment as to who's the best Christian and who's got religion and who hasn't," returned the spinster bridling.
"Well, none o' your long-faced, sour-looking Christians for me!" exclaimed Rhoda Jane, "I'd never want to get religion till the last minute, if I wasn't to be 'lowed to laugh and joke no more."
"I can not read the heart, nor can any other human creature," said Mildred, replying to Miss Drybread's last remark; "but Jesus says, 'By their fruits ye shall know them.' 'He that keepeth my commandments he it is that loveth me;' and when you live with people and see them constantly serving God with gladness, walking in his ways, rejoicing in his love, making the Bible always their rule of faith and practice, showing far more solicitude about heavenly than about earthly things, both for themselves and their children, I think you may be very sure they are real Christians."
"I think so too!" said Claudina emphatically.
"So do I," "and I," chimed in several other voices, "but do you know any such folks?"
"I have been describing my father and mother," Mildred said. "And my dear Aunt Wealthy too."
"That's a fact," spoke up Viny. "You 'ave to live with folks to find 'em out, and I've lived there and I never seen better Christians; they don't keep their religion for Sundays, but Mr. Keith 'e reads in the good book hevery night and mornin' and prays just like a minister—honly not so long—and they sing 'ymns. And I never 'eard a cross word pass between Mr. and Mrs. Keith—or Mrs. Stan'ope heither, and they never threaten the children they'll do something hawful like breakin' their bones or skinnin' of 'em alive, has some folks does; but just speaks to 'em quiet like, sayin' exactly what they mean: and they're always minded too."
Chapter Fourteenth.
"Jest and youthful jollity,
Quips and cranks and wanton wiles,
Nods and becks and wreathed smiles."
"There had better be less talk, if these rags are all to be sewed to-day," remarked Miss Drybread, taking a fresh supply from the basket, then straightening herself till she was, if possible, more erect than before.
"I can talk and work too; my needle haint stopped because my tongue was runnin'," retorted Viny; "and it strikes me you've been doin' your share as well's the rest."
"My second ball's done," said Claudina, tossing it up.
"A good big one too, and wound real tight," said Rhoda Jane taking it, giving it a squeeze, then rolling it into a corner where quite a pile had collected.
"How quick you are, Claudina," said Mildred.
"Not so very; I've been at it quite a good while. Some folks can pretty nearly make two to my one." And she glanced toward Miss Drybread who was just beginning to wind her second.
"But 'tain't everybody that winds em as good and solid as you do, Claudina," said another girl significantly; "windin' loose can make a ball grow fast, I tell you!"
"'All is not gold that glitters,'" quoted Mildred.
"I'd begin to wind if I were you," said Claudina, "you have quite a pile there and it might get into a tangle."
"Thank you. I'm new to the business," said Mildred laughing, "and shall take the advice of an older hand."
"Supper's ready," announced Minerva, opening the kitchen door.
"Put down your rags and walk right out, ladies," said Rhoda Jane.
"It seems to me that I, for one, need some preparation," said Mildred, dropping hers and looking at her hands.
"Oh yes, we'll wash out here," said Rhoda Jane, leading the way.
A tin bucket full of water, a dipper and washbasin, all bright from a recent scouring, stood on a bench in the shed at the outer kitchen door; a piece of brown soap lay there also, and a clean crash towel hung on a nail in the wall close by.
The girls used these in turn, laughing and chatting merrily the while, then gathered about the table, which was bountifully spread with good plain country fare—chicken, ham, dried beef, pickles, tomatoes, cucumbers and radishes, cheese, eggs, pie, cake and preserves, in several varieties, hot cakes and cold bread, tea and coffee.
None of the family partook with their guests except Rhoda Jane; they would eat afterwards; and Mrs. Lightcap busied herself now in waiting upon the table; filling the tea and coffee cups in the shed where the cooking stove stood during the months of the year when its heat was objectionable in the house.
"I don't know as we've earned our supper, Mis' Lightcap," remarked one of the girls, stirring her tea; "we hain't begun to git all them rags sewed up yet."
"Well, then, I'll just set you to work again as soon as you're done eatin'; that'll do just as well; folks don't always pay in advance, you know."
"And if we don't get through 'fore the boys come we'll make them help," said Rhoda Jane.
"What boys?" queried Mildred; whereat several of the girls giggled.
"Why the fellows, of course," laughed Miss Lightcap; "the boys is what we mostly call 'em; though some of 'em's pretty old, I should judge, for that."
"Yes, there's Rocap Stubblefield, must be thirty at least," said one.
"And Nick Ransquattle's twenty-five if he's a day," remarked another.
"Well, the rest's young enough," said Mrs. Lightcap. "Pass that cake there, Rhoda Jane. There's my Gotobed just turned twenty-one, and York Mocker, and Wallace Ormsby, and Claudina's brother Will's all younger by some months or a year or so."
The meal concluded, the work went on quite briskly again, Mildred catching now and then a whispered word or two about the desirableness of getting through with it in time to have some fun; but the raw material for several more balls still remained in the basket when "the boys" began to come.
Gotobed was naturally among the first. He was quite "slicked up," as Rhoda Jane elegantly expressed it, though his toilet had been made under difficulties.
The only legitimate way of reaching the second story and his Sunday clothes, was by a stairway leading up from the front room, where the girls were.
The windows of his bedroom, however, looked out upon the leanto which formed the kitchen part of the building and whose roof was not many feet higher than that of the shed.
Watching his opportunity for doing so unseen, he climbed upon the shed, gained the roof of the leanto, and entered his room by the window.
There
