Mother | Page 6

and travel, to be a companion to my husband. I don't want to be a
mere upper servant!"
"No, of course not," assented Mrs. Porter, vaguely, soothingly.

"Well, if we are going to stay here, I'll light the stove," Margaret said
after a pause. "B-r-r-r! this room gets cold with the windows open! I
wonder why Kelly doesn't bring us more wood?"
"I guess--I'll stay!" Mrs. Porter said uncertainly, following her to the
big book closet off the schoolroom, where a little gas stove and a small
china closet occupied one wide shelf. The water for the tea and bouillon
was put over the flame in a tiny enamelled saucepan; they set forth on a
fringed napkin crackers and sugar and spoons.
At this point, a small girl of eleven with a brilliant, tawny head, and a
wide and toothless smile, opened the door cautiously, and said,
blinking rapidly with excitement,--
"Mark, Mother theth pleath may thee come in?"
This was Rebecca, one of Margaret's five younger brothers and sisters,
and a pupil of the school herself. Margaret smiled at the eager little
face.
"Hello, darling! Is Mother here? Certainly she can! I believe,"--she said,
turning, suddenly radiant, to Mrs. Porter,--"I'll just bet you she's
brought us some lunch!"
"Thee brought uth our luncheth--eggth and thpith caketh and
everything!" exulted Rebecca, vanishing, and a moment later Mrs.
Paget appeared.
She was a tall woman, slender but large of build, and showing, under a
shabby raincoat and well pinned-up skirt, the gracious generous lines of
shoulders and hips, the deep-bosomed erect figure that is rarely seen
except in old daguerreotypes, or the ideal of some artist two
generations ago. The storm to-day had blown an unusual color into her
thin cheeks, her bright, deep eyes were like Margaret's, but the hair that
once had shown an equally golden lustre was dull and smooth now, and
touched with gray. She came in smiling, and a little breathless,
"Mother, you didn't come out in all this rain just to bring us our

lunches!" Margaret protested, kissing the cold, fresh face.
"Well, look at the lunch you silly girls were going to eat!" Mrs. Paget
protested in turn, in a voice rich with amusement. "I love to walk in the
rain, Mark; I used to love it when I was a girl. Tom and Sister are at our
house, Mrs. Potter, playing with Duncan and Baby. I'll keep them until
after school, then I'll send them over to walk home with you."
"Oh, you are an angel!" said the younger mother, gratefully. And "You
are an angel, Mother!" Margaret echoed, as Mrs. Paget opened a
shabby suitcase, and took from it a large jar of hot rich soup, a little
blue bowl of stuffed eggs, half a fragrant whole-wheat loaf in a white
napkin, a little glass full of sweet butter, and some of the spice cakes to
which Rebecca had already enthusiastically alluded.
"There!" said she, pleased with their delight, "now take your time,
you've got three-quarters of an hour. Julie devilled the eggs, and the
sweet-butter man happened to come just as I was starting."
"Delicious!--You've saved our lives," Margaret said, busy with cups
and spoons. "You'll stay, Mother?" she broke off suddenly, as Mrs.
Paget closed the suitcase.
"I can't, dear! I must go back to the children," her mother said
cheerfully. No coaxing proving of any avail, Margaret went with her to
the top of the hall stairs.
"What's my girl worrying about?" Mrs. Paget asked, with a keen glance
at Margaret's face.
"Oh, nothing!" Margaret used both hands to button the top button of her
mother's coat. "I was hungry and cold, and I didn't want to walk home
in the rain!" she confessed, raising her eyes to the eyes so near her own.
"Well, go back to your lunch," Mrs. Paget urged, after a brief pause,
not quite satisfied with the explanation. Margaret kissed her again,
watched her descend the stairs, and leaning over the banister called
down to her softly:

"Don't worry about me, Mother!"
"No--no--no!" her mother called back brightly. Indeed, Margaret
reflected, going back to the much-cheered Emily, it was not in her
nature to worry.
No, Mother never worried, or if she did, nobody ever knew it. Care,
fatigue, responsibility, hard long years of busy days and broken nights
had left their mark on her face; the old beauty that had been hers was
chiselled to a mere pure outline now; but there was a contagious
serenity in Mrs. Paget's smile, a clear steadiness in her calm eyes, and
her forehead, beneath an unfashionably plain sweep of hair, was
untroubled and smooth.
The children's mother was a simple woman; so absorbed in the hourly
problems attendant upon the housing and feeding of her husband and
family that