Esther | Page 9

much separated of late years.
Allan was five years older than I; he was only a year younger than Fred,
but the difference between them was very great. Allan looked the elder
of the two; he was not so tall as Fred, but he was strongly built and
sturdy; he was dark-complexioned, and his features were almost as
irregular as mine; but in a man that did not so much matter, and very
few people called Allan plain.
Allan had always been my special brother--most sisters know what I
mean by that term. Allan was undemonstrative; he seldom petted or
made much of me, but a word from him was worth a hundred from
Fred; and there was a quiet unspoken sympathy between us that was
sufficiently palpable. If Allan wanted his gloves mended he always
came to me, and not to Carrie. I was his chief correspondent, and he
made me the confidante of his professional hopes and fears. In return,
he good-humoredly interested himself in my studies, directed my
reading, and considered himself at liberty to find fault with everything
that did not please him. He was a little peremptory sometimes, but I did
not mind that half so much as Fred's sarcasms; and he never distressed
me as Fred did, by laughing at my large hands, or wondering why I was
not so natty in my dress as Carrie.

CHAPTER III.
DOT.
I went to my room to unpack my things, and by-and-by Carrie joined
me.
I half hoped that she meant to help me, but she sat down by the window
and said, with a sigh, how tired she was; and certainly her eyes had a

weary look.
She watched me for some time in silence, but once or twice she sighed
very heavily.
"I wish you could leave those things, Esther," she said, at last, not
pettishly--Carrie was never pettish--but a little too plaintively. "I have
not had a creature to whom I could talk since you left home in April."
The implied compliment was very nice, but I did not half like leaving
my things--I was rather old-maidish in my ways, and never liked half
measures; but I remembered reading once about "the lust of finishing,"
and what a test of unselfishness it was to put by a half-completed task
cheerfully at the call of another duty. Perhaps it was my duty to leave
my unpacking and listen to Carrie, but there was one little point in her
speech that did not please me.
"You could talk to mother," I objected; for mother always listened to
one so nicely.
"I tried it once, but mother did not understand," sighed Carrie. I used to
wish she did not sigh so much. "We had quite an argument, but I saw it
was no use--that I should never bring her to my way of thinking. She
was brought up so differently; girls were allowed so little liberty then.
My notions seemed to distress her. She said that I was peculiar, and
that I carried things too far, and that she wished I were more like other
girls; and then she kissed me, and said I was very good, and she did not
mean to hurt me; but she thought home had the first claim; and so on.
You know mother's way."
"I think mother was right there--you think so yourself, do you not
Carrie?" I asked anxiously, for this seemed to me the A B C of
common sense.
"Oh, of course," rather hastily. "Charity begins at home, but it ought
not to stop there. If I chose to waste my time practicing for Fred's violin,
and attending to all his thousand and one fads and fancies, what would
become of all my parish work? You should have heard Mr. Arnold's

sermon last Sunday, Esther; he spoke of the misery and poverty and
ignorance that lay around us outside our homes, and of the loiterers and
idlers within those homes." And Carrie's eyes looked sad and serious.
"That is true," I returned, and then I stopped, and Jessie's words came
to my mind, "Even Carrie makes mistakes at times." For the first time
in my life the thought crossed me; in my absence would it not have
been better for Carrie to have been a little more at home? It was Jessie's
words and mother's careworn face that put the thought into my head;
but the next moment I had dismissed it as heresy. My good, unselfish
Carrie, it was impossible that she could make mistakes! Carrie's next
speech chimed in well with my unspoken thoughts.
"Home duties come first, of course, Esther--no one in their senses could
deny such a thing; but we must be on our guard against make- believe
duties. It is my duty to