The Christmas Child | Page 5

he had been talking to some one a long way off. But
suddenly Aunt Priscilla spoke, in a voice so terrible and loud that she
woke up in a fright. Her aunt was standing in the middle of the floor,
and the light from a candle fell upon her face, weary and grey, and
drawn into a frown of stern and passionate anger.
"She shall never enter my doors again!" she exclaimed; "neither she nor
her husband, Evan Price--the worst scamp in the country! I 'll never
forgive her. Deceiving me all these months! Let nobody ever name her
name to me again; she's dead to me for evermore."
"No, no," said old Nathan, sorrowfully; "don't thee harden thy heart
against her, Miss Priscilla. She 's been deceived as well as us, poor,
young, ignorant lass! She does n't know what Evan is yet: a handsome
young raskill, as all the girls make much of. If she repents--and she will
repent, poor creature--thou must pardon her."
"Never!" cried Aunt Priscilla, "not on my death-bed!"
"'Forgive us our sins as we forgive them as sin against us,'" he
answered, in a very mournful and solemn voice.
"I'll never pray that prayer again!" she said fiercely. "I haven't sinned
against the Lord as she's sinned against me. I've never brought shame
and disgrace on Him. The Lord may pardon her, but I can't!"
"Hush!" exclaimed Nathan, "hush! God Himself is hearkening to us.
Our sins against Him are as if we owed Him ten thousand talents; and
the sins of our fellow-creatures against us are no more than a hundred
pence. It is our crucified Lord that says it. Ah! thou knowest it well. 'O
thou wicked servant, said the lord in the parable,'I forgave thee all that
debt because thou desiredst me; shouldest not thou also have had
compassion on thy fellow-servant, even as I had pity on thee? And his
lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay

all that was due unto him. So likewise shall My Heavenly Father do
also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother
his trespasses.' It's an awful thing when the Heavenly Father delivers a
soul to the tormentors! May God in His infinite mercy deliver thee;
only take heed that thou drive not away His Holy Spirit from thee!"
Aunt Priscilla said no more, but went away upstairs, leaving the kitchen
in utter darkness. Joan trembled from head to foot as she listened to her
heavy tread in the room above. When old Nathan struck a light, her
white, scared little face was the first thing he saw. He sat down on the
settle beside her, and took her tenderly into his arms.
"It's a sad day for thee, too, my little lamb," he said; "thou 's lost thy
playfellow, and there's hard times before thee."
"Where's Rhoda?" asked Joan, trembling.
"She's been tempted away from us," he said sorrowfully, "by one as
pretends he loves her more than us. But thou must go to bed, my little
lass. See! I'll carry thee upstairs. I'm a poor, rough nurse for thee, but
my room's next to thine, on the other side o' the wall, and thee can cry
to me i' th' night if thou 's frightened. And to-morrow I'll knock a hole
through the wall, so as thou can hear me speak to thee. But there's no
wall between thee and the Lord; He's close beside thee, and thou need
never be affrighted."
But little Joan was frightened, both that night and many another dark
hour, when she felt herself alone in the solitary little room. The child's
life became very hard and desolate. Aunt Priscilla took no notice of her
beyond providing her with food to eat and clothes to wear. She did not
talk to her, and she never took her on her lap or kissed her. Sometimes
Joan would creep timidly to her side and look up into her face, but
Aunt Priscilla never seemed to see her.
There was nothing for the little girl to do but to wander solitarily about
the fields or sit up in her lonely room with no one to speak to her for
hours together. She was more desolate than she had been in London;
for there her mother had sometimes come up to the attic to play with

her, or to nurse her in her arms for a few minutes. There was no one to
love her now, except old Nathan.
There was a still greater change in Miss Priscilla Parry. The neighbours
said she was gone out of her mind; and it was true that all her nature
seemed turned to hardness and sternness. She was never seen to smile,
nor did