It is for us to help Him by being kind and making her welcome."At the church door we parted and sat with our teachers,but for the first time as I went down the aisle I was not thinking of my linen dress,my patent leather slippers,and my pretty curls.It suddenly seemed cheap to me to twist my hair when it was straight as a shingle,and cut my head on tin.If the Lord had wanted me to have curls,my hair would have been like Sally's.Seemed to me hers tried to see into what big soft curls it could roll.May said ours was so straight it bent back the other way.Anyway,I made up my mind to talk it over with father and always wear braids after that,if I could get him to coax mother to let me.
Our church was quite new and it was beautiful.All the casings were oiled wood,and the walls had just a little yellow in the last skin coating used to make them smooth,so they were a creamy colour,and the blinds were yellow.The windows were wide open and the wind drifted through,while the birds sang as much as they ever do in August,among the trees and bushes of the cemetery.Every one had planted so many flowers of all kinds on the graves you could scent sweet odours.Often a big,black-striped,brown butterfly came sailing in through one of the windows,followed the draft across the room,and out of another.
I was thinking something funny:it was about what the Princess had said of other people,and whether hers were worse.I looked at my father sitting in calm dignity in his Sunday suit and thought him quite as fine and handsome as mother did.Every Sabbath he wore the same suit,he sat in the same spot,he worshipped the Lord in his calm,earnest way.The ministers changed,but father was as much a part of the service as the Bible on the desk or the communion table.I wondered if people said things about him,and if they did,what they were.I never had heard.Twisting in my seat,one by one I studied the faces on the men's side,and then the women.It was a mighty good-looking crowd.Some had finer clothes than others--that is always the way--but as a rule every one was clean,neat,and good to see.From some you scarcely could turn away.There was Widow Fall.She was French,from Virginia,and she talked like little tinkly notes of music.I just loved to hear her,and she walked like high-up royalty.Her dress was always black,with white bands at the neck and sleeves,black rustly silk,and her eyes and hair were like the dress.There was a little red on her cheeks and lips,and her face was always grave until she saw you directly before her,and then she smiled the sweetest smile.
Maybe Sarah Hood was not pretty,but there was something about her lean face and shining eyes that made you look twice before you were sure of it,and by that time you had got so used to her,you liked her better as she was,and wouldn't have changed her for anything.Mrs.Fritz had a pretty face and dresses and manners,and so did Hannah Dover,only she talked too much.So Istudied them and remembered what the Princess had said,and I wondered if she heard some one say that Peter Justice beat his wife,or if she showed it in her face and manner.She reminded me of a scared cowslip that had been cut and laid in the sun an hour.I don't know as that expresses it.Perhaps a flower couldn't look scared,but it could be wilted and faded.I wondered if she ever had bright hair,laughing eyes,and red in her lips and cheeks.She must have been pretty if she had.
At last I reached my mother.There was nothing scared or faded about her,and she was dreadfully sick too,once in a while since she had the fever.She was a little bit of a woman,coloured like a wild rose petal,face and body--a piece of pink porcelain Dutch,father said.She had brown eyes,hair like silk,and she always had three best dresses.There was one of alpaca or woollen,of black,gray or brown,and two silks.Always there was a fine rustly black one with a bonnet and mantle to match,and then a softer,finer one of either gold brown,like her hair,or dainty gray,like a dove's wing.When these grew too old for fine use,she wore them to Sunday-school and had a fresh one for best.There was a new gray in her closet at home,so she put on the old brown to-day,and she was lovely in it.
Usually the minister didn't come for church services until Sunday-school was half over,so the superintendent read a chapter,Daddy Debs prayed,and all of us stood up and sang:
"Ring Out the Joy Bells."Then the superintendent read the lesson over as impressively as he could.The secretary made his report,we sang another song,gathered the pennies,and each teacher took a class and talked over the lesson a few minutes.
Then we repeated the verses we had committed to memory to our teachers;the member of each class who had learned the nicest texts,and knew them best,was selected to recite before the school.Beginning with the littlest people,we came to the big folks.Each one recited two texts until they reached the class above mine.We walked to the front,stood inside the altar,made a little bow,and the superintendent kept score.I could see that mother appeared worried when Leon's name was called for his class,for she hadn't heard him,and she was afraid he would forget.
Among the funny things about Leon was this:while you had to drive other boys of his age to recite,you almost had to hold him to keep him from it.Father said he was born for a politician or a preacher,if he would be good,and grow into the right kind of a man to do such responsible work.
"I forgot several last Sabbath,so I have thirteen to-day,"he said politely.
