A Missionary Twig Part 13

Not long after this, one of the ladies Mrs. Scott worked for gave her a partly-worn sateen dress and a black straw bonnet, so that she was fitted out to go to church all summer; and go she did with great enjoyment. It was a pleasure to Jennie also, for with listening to the singing as she lay in bed, and hearing about all that was said and done from her mother, she almost felt as though she had been at church herself.

The purple Bible was not locked up any more, but kept handy for Miss Alice to read, and to mark pa.s.sages for Mrs. Scott to read in the evening, for Jennie liked to hear the same things over and over.

The plan that popped into Marty's head that day she told to Edith on the way home, after they had left Cousin Alice.

"O Edie!" she said, "wouldn't it be nice to give Jennie a Bible for her very own?"

"You mean for you and me together to give it?" said Edith.

"Yes. You know my birthday comes in August and yours in September, and we always get some money--"

"And we could each give half, and get Jennie a Bible," broke in Edith.

"Yes; or if we _couldn't_ do it then, we might have enough by Christmas."

"And it would be a _beautiful_ Christmas gift!"

"Oh! do let us do it," said Marty, seizing Edith and whirling her around and around.

"Yes, do," said Edith, panting for breath.

CHAPTER XII.

"NOW DON'T FORGET!"

It was well on in June, and Mrs. Ashford was very busy making preparations to go to the country with the children.

Two successive summers they had spent at a very pleasant mountain farmhouse, but the last year they had gone to the seash.o.r.e. This summer Mrs. Ashford decided for the farmhouse again, to Marty's great delight, for it was a perfect paradise to her.

She herself had many preparations to make--deciding which dolls to take and which to leave at home, and getting them all ready for whatever was to be their fate. It also took a good deal of time to choose from her little library the few books her mamma allowed her to take for rainy days. It was a weighty matter, too, to select a suitable present for Evaline, the little girl at the farmhouse, as her father suggested she should do, and gave her money to buy it.

Then Jennie was very much on her mind.

"What will she do for soup and jelly and things when we are away, mamma?" she asked anxiously.

"I shall tell Katie to carry her something now and then," Mrs. Ashford replied. "Besides, Cousin Alice will be in town until August, and she will look out for Jennie. Then Mrs. Scott told me the other day that she had got all her back rent paid up now, and she expects to have three days' work every week all summer; so they will get on very well."

Another day Marty came home from Jennie's in distress.

"Mamma," she said, "the doctor says Jennie may soon begin to sit up in an easy-chair; and they haven't got any. Their two chairs are the most _uneasy_ things I ever saw in my life. Now, how is she going to sit up?"

Mrs. Ashford laughed as she said, "Well, I was going to give you a surprise, but I may as well tell you now that I have sent that old rocking-chair that was up in the storeroom to be mended, and am going to give it to Mrs. Scott."

Marty was overjoyed to hear this.

"And, oh! mamma, wont you give them the small table that stands in the third-story hall? You always say it is only in the way there, and it would be so nice beside Jennie's bed to put her things on, instead of a chair."

"Yes, I suppose they might as well have it."

"And the red cover that belongs to it, mamma?"

"O Marty, Marty!" exclaimed her mother, laughing. "How many more things will you want for Jennie? But the red cover may go too."

These things were sent, together with some of Marty's underclothing, a pair of half-worn slippers, and a couple of Mrs. Ashford's cast-off gingham dresses, to be made into wrappers for Jennie. Edith and Cousin Alice also brought some articles for Jennie's comfort.

"She will need a footstool with that chair," said Cousin Alice. "I have an extra ha.s.sock in my room; I'll bring that."

Mrs. Howell sent an old but soft and pretty comfort to spread over the chair, and which would also be handy for an additional covering in case of a cold night.

"A curtain on the window would soften the light on hot afternoons," Miss Alice thought. So she made one of some white barred muslin she had and put it up. She also thought that as Jennie still had not much appet.i.te, some prettier dishes than those Mrs. Scott had--they were very few, and very coa.r.s.e and battered--might make the food taste better.

"I know, when I am ill," she said to Mrs. Ashford, "the way my food is served makes a great difference."

So she brought a cheap but pretty plate, cup, and saucer, with which Jennie was extremely delighted.

"After we all go away there wont be anybody to take flowers to Jennie,"

said Edith, "and I'm afraid she'll miss them. She does enjoy them so much. I've a great mind to buy her a geranium. May I, mamma? They're only ten cents."

"Of course you may. I think it would be very nice for Jennie and her mother to have something of the kind growing in their room," said Mrs.

Howell.

She went with Edith to the florist's, and after helping her to select a scarlet geranium, she bought a pot of mignonette and another of sweet alyssum for Edith to give to Jennie.

Marty helped Edith to carry their plants to their destination, and what rejoicing there was over that window-garden!

"It's too much! too much!" exclaimed Mrs. Scott, wiping her eyes as she looked around the now really comfortable room.

Then when Miss Alice came in, as she did presently, with four bright-colored j.a.panese fans which she proceeded to fasten on the bare walls, that seemed to cap the climax.

"There never were kinder ladies--never!" exclaimed Mrs. Scott, while Jennie was too much overcome to say anything.

"It wont be so hard for Jennie to be shut up here, and she wont miss Marty and Edith so much, if she has these little bits of bright things to look at," said Miss Alice.

Marty took the greatest interest in helping to arrange all these things for Jennie's comfort and happiness, and in thinking, too, how much pleasure they would bring into poor Mrs. Scott's hard-working life. When she went home after her final visit to Landis Court, she said with a sigh of relief,

"Now they're fixed comfor'ble, and we can go as soon as we like."

All this time that she had been so engaged with Jennie she had not neglected the mission band, but attended the meetings regularly and became more and more interested in what she heard there.

She still pursued the plan of giving to missions at least a tenth of all the money she got. During the spring and early summer she had had two or three "windfalls"--one or two small presents of money, and once her father had given her a quarter for hunting out from an enormous pile certain numbers of a magazine he wished to consult. Besides she had made a little money solely for the missionary-box by hemming dusters for her mother.

The meeting on the third Sat.u.r.day in June was very important, as it was the last regular meeting that would be held until September, and there were many arrangements to be made.

Most of the girls and Miss Walsh herself expected to be away two months, but several members were to be at home all summer and a few were only going away for a short time. Miss Walsh said she did not think it fair that those remaining in town should be deprived of their missionary meetings. It had therefore been decided that the meetings should be continued, though not just in the same way as during the rest of the year. No business was to be transacted and the girls were not to sew unless they wished.