Syl Graham was an only child. Her name was Sylvia, but everybody called her Syl, except that sometimes, half playfully and half chidingly, her father called her Sylly. But that was a liberty no one else took,—and for which Mr. Graham himself was not unlikely to pay in extra indulgence.

Syl was seventeen, and she had never known any trouble in all her young, bright life. Her mother had died when she was two years old; and this, which might easily have been the greatest of misfortunes,—though Syl was too young to know it,—had been turned almost into a blessing by the devotion of her father’s sister, Aunt Rachel, who came to take care of the little one then, and had never left her since.

Not the dead Mrs. Graham herself could have been more motherly or more tender than Aunt Rachel; and the girl had grown up like a flower in a shaded nook, on which no rough wind had ever been allowed to breathe.

And a pretty flower she was; so her father thought when she ran into the hall to meet him, as he came in from business at the close of the short November day.

The last rays of daylight just bronzed her chestnut hair. Her face was delicately fair,—as the complexion that goes with such hair usually is,—colorless save in the lips, which seemed as much brighter than other lips as if they had added to their own color all that which was absent from the fair, colorless cheeks. The brown eyes were dancing with pleasant thoughts, the little, girlish figure was wonderfully graceful, and Papa Graham looked down at this fair, sweet maiden with a fond pride, which the sourest critic could hardly have had a heart to condemn.

“Are you cross?” she said laughingly, as she helped him off with his overcoat.

“Very,” he answered, with gravity.

“I mean are you worse than usual? Will you be in the best humor now or after dinner?”

“After dinner, decidedly, if Aunt Rachel’s coffee is good.”

Syl nodded her piquant little head. “I’ll wait, then.”

The dinner was good enough to have tempted a less hungry man than Mr. Graham, and the coffee was perfect. Papa’s dressing-gown and slippers were ready, upstairs; and when he had sat down in the great, soft easy-chair that awaited him, and his daughter had settled herself on a stool at his feet, I think it would have been hard to find a more contented-looking man in all New York.

“Now I’m very sure you are as good as such a bear can be,” said saucy Syl; “and now we’ll converse.”

To “converse” was Syl’s pet phrase for the course of request, reasoning, entreaty, by which Papa Graham was usually brought to accede to all her wishes, however extravagant. He rested his hand now on her shining chestnut braids, and thought how like she was to the young wife he had loved so well, and lost so early. Then he said teasingly,—

“What is it, this time? A Paris doll, with a trunk and a bandbox; or a hand-organ?”

“For shame, papa! The doll was four years ago.”

“All the more reason it must be worn out. Then it’s the hand-organ. But I must draw the line somewhere,—you can’t have the monkey. If Punch and Judy would do, though?”

“Now, Father Lucius, you know I gave up the hand-organ two years ago, and took a piano for my little upstairs room instead; and you know I’m seventeen. Am I likely, at this age, to want monkeys, Punch and Judys, and things?”

“O, no! I forgot. Seventeen,—it must be a sewing-machine. You want to make all your endless bibs and tuckers more easily. Well, I’ll consent.”

Syl blushed. It was a sore point between her and Aunt Rachel that she so seldom sewed for herself. Aunt Rachel had old-fashioned notions, and believed in girls that made their own pretty things.

“Now, papa, you are not good-humored at all. I had better have asked you before dinner. You don’t even let me tell you what I want.”

Papa sobered his face into a look of respectful attention, and waited silently. But now Syl was not quite ready to speak.

“Don’t you think pomegranate is a pretty color, papa?”

“What is it like?”

“O, it’s the deepest, richest, brightest, humanest red you ever saw.”

“Why, I think it must be like your lips;” and he drew her to him, and kissed the bright young mouth with a lazy content.

“Perhaps it is like my lips; then, surely it will look well with them.”

“Where does this blossom of beauty grow?”

“It grows at Stewart’s. It has been woven into a lovely, soft-falling silk, at four dollars a yard. Twenty-five yards makes a gown, and eight yards of velvet makes the trimming and the sleeveless jacket, and the velvet is six dollars a yard. And then there is Madame Bodin, she charges like a horrid old Jew,—forty dollars just to look at a gown; and then there are the linings and buttons and things. Have you kept account, papa, and added it all up in your head?”

“I think it means about two hundred dollars. Isn’t that what you call it, Sylly?”

“Yes, if you please. It’ll be worth that, won’t it, to have your daughter look like a love, when all the people come on New Year’s Day?”

“So that’s it,—that’s what this conspiracy against my peace and my pocket has for its object,—that Miss Syl Graham may sit at the receipt of callers on New Year’s Day, in a robe like a red, red rose. O Sylly, Sylly!”

Syl pouted a little, the most becoming pout in the world.

“Well, I’m sure I thought you cared how I look. If you don’t, never mind. My old black silk is still very neat and decent.”

“September, October, November,—it’s nearly three months old, isn’t it? What a well-behaved gown it must be to have kept neat and decent so long! And as to the other, I’ll consider, and you can ask me again when I come home to-morrow.”

Syl knew what Papa Graham’s considers meant, and how they always ended. She had gained her point, and she danced off and sang to the piano some old Scotch airs that her father loved, because Syl’s mother used to sing them; and Papa Graham listened dreamily to the music, while his thoughts went back twenty years, to the first winter when he brought his girl-bride home, only a year older, then, than Syl was now. He remembered how the firelight used to shine on her fair, upturned face, as she knelt beside him; how sweet her voice was; how pure and true and fond her innocent young heart. And now Syl was all he had left of her.

Should he lose Syl herself, soon? Would some bold wooer come and carry her away, and leave him with only Aunt Rachel’s quiet figure and fading face beside him for the rest of his life?

Just then Syl might have asked him not in vain for any thing, even to the half of his kingdom.

Next morning Syl went into the sewing-room. A young girl just about her own age was there—altering, sewing, making all the foolish little fancies in which Syl’s heart delighted, though her idle fingers never wrought at them. Out of pure kindness of heart Syl found her way into the sewing-room very often when Mary Gordon was there. She knew her presence carried pleasure with it, and often she used to take some story or poem and read to the young listener, with the always busy fingers, and the gentle, grateful face.

But to-day she found the girl’s eyes very red as if with long weeping. If Syl was selfish it was only because she never came in contact with the pains and needs of others. She had “fed on the roses and lain among the lilies of life,”—how was she to know the hurt of its stinging nettles? But she could not have been the lovesome, charming girl she was if she had had a nature hard and indifferent to the pains of others.

To see Mary Gordon’s red eyes was enough. Instantly she drew the work out of the fingers that trembled so; and then she set herself to draw the secret sorrow out of the poor, trembling heart.

It was the old story, so sadly common and yet so bitterly sad, of a mother wasting away and fading out of life, and a daughter struggling to take care of her, and breaking her heart because she could do so little.

“I’m used to all that,” the girl said sadly, “and I don’t let myself cry for what I can’t help. But this morning I heard her say to herself, as I was getting every thing ready for her, ‘O, the long, lonesome day!’ She thought I did not hear her, for she never complains; but somehow it broke me down. I keep thinking of her, suffering and weary and all alone. But I can’t help that, either; and I must learn to be contented in thinking that I do my best.”

“But can’t you stay at home with her and work there?” cried Syl, all eager sympathy and interest.

“No, I can’t get work enough in that way. People want their altering and fixing done in their own houses, and plain sewing pays so poorly. Sometimes I’ve thought if I only had a machine, so I could get a great deal done, I might manage but to hire one would eat up all my profits.”

Syl thought a little silent while; and it was a pretty sight to see the fair young face settle into such deep earnestness.

“Well,” she said at length, “at least you shall stay at home with her to-morrow; for all those ruffles can be done just as well there as here, and you shall carry them home with you. And you’d better go early this afternoon; there’ll be enough work to last you, and I can’t bear to think of her waiting for you, and wanting you, so many long hours. We’ll give her a little surprise.”

Mary Gordon did not speak for a moment. I think she was getting her voice steady, for when she did begin it trembled.

“I can’t thank you, Miss Syl,—it’s no use to try; but the strange part is how you understand it all, when you’ve no mother yourself.”

“Ah, but you see I have papa and auntie, and I just know.”

That day, after Syl and Aunt Rachel had lunched together, Syl said, in a coaxing little way she had,—

“Aunt Rachel, we never want to see the other half of that cold chicken again, do we?”

“Why, Syl—we”—

“Why, auntie, no—we never want to-morrow’s lunch furnished coldly forth by this sad relic. And there’s a tumbler of jelly we don’t want, either—and those rolls, and,—let me see, can sick people eat cake?”

“Why, Syl Graham, what are you talking about! Who’s sick?”

Syl grew sober.

“I’m thinking about poor Mary Gordon’s mother, auntie. She’s sick, and dying by inches; and Mary has to leave her all alone; and I’ve told her she shall stay at home to-morrow and make my ruffles, and we’ll pay her just the same as if she came here. And don’t you see that we must give her her dinner to take home, since she can’t come here after it?”

Aunt Rachel never said a word, but she got up and kissed Syl on each cheek. Then she brought a basket, and into it went the cold chicken and a cold tongue and jelly and buttered rolls and fruit, till even Syl was satisfied; and she took the heavy basket and danced away with it to the sewing-room, with a bright light in her dear brown eyes.

“I think you’d best go now,” she said. “I can’t get your mother, waiting there alone, out of my mind, and it’s spoiling my afternoon, don’t you see? And because you mustn’t come here to dine to-morrow, you must carry your dinner home with you; and Aunt Rachel put some fruit and some jelly in the basket that maybe your mother will like.”

That night, when Mr. Lucius Graham let himself into the hall with his latch-key, his daughter heard him and went to meet him, as usual. But she was very silent, and he missed his teasing, saucy, provoking Syl.

“Why, daughter, are you in a dream?” he asked once during dinner; but she only laughed and shook her head. She held her peace until she had him at her mercy, in the great easy-chair, and she was on the stool beside him, as her wont was. Then, suddenly, her question came.

“Papa, do you think a pomegranate silk without velvet would be very bad?”

He was inclined to tease her, and began with “Hideous!” but then he saw that her lips were fairly trembling, and her face full of eagerness, and forbore.

“How did you know you were to have the silk at all? But you know your power over me. Here is your needful;” and he put into her hands ten bright, new twenty-dollar bills.

“O, thank you! and do you think it would be bad without the velvet?”

“Sylly, no; but why shouldn’t you have the velvet if you want it?”

And then came the whole story of poor Mary Gordon, and—in such an eager tone,—

“Don’t you see, with the money the velvet would cost, and a little more, I could get her the sewing-machine; and Madame Bodin wouldn’t ask so much to make the dress if it is plainer?”

Mr. Graham was a rich man, and his first thought was to give her the money for the machine, and let her have her pretty dress, as she had fancied it, first. But a second thought restrained him. She was just beginning to learn the joy and beauty of self-sacrifice. Should he interfere? He kissed her with a half-solemn tenderness, and answered her,—

“You shall do precisely as you please, my dear. The two hundred dollars is yours. Use it just as you like. I shall never inquire into its fate again.”

And then she went away—and was it her voice or that of some blessed spirit that came to him, a moment after, from the shadowy corner where the piano stood, singing an old middle-age hymn, about the city—

The next day, who so busy and happy as Syl—dragging Aunt Rachel from one warehouse to another—it was in the days when sewing-machines were costly—till she was quite sure she had found just the right machine; and then ordering it sent, at three o’clock, no earlier, no later, to Miss Gordon, No. 2 Crescent Place.

At a quarter before three Syl went there herself. The pleasure of witnessing Mary Gordon’s surprise was the thing she had promised herself, in lieu of velvet on her gown. She found the poor room neat and clean, and by no means without traces of comfort and refinement; and Mrs. Gordon was a sweet and gentle woman, such as Mary’s mother must have been to be in keeping with Mary. She chatted with them for a few minutes, noticing the invalid’s short breath and frequent cough, and Mary’s careful tenderness over her.

“It’s too bad Mary can’t be at home all the time,” said Syl.

“Yes; but then to have her to-day is such a blessing. If you knew how we had enjoyed our day together, and our feast together, I know you would feel paid for any inconvenience it cost you.”

Just then an express wagon rumbled up to the door and the bell rang loudly. Mary opened it at once, for their room was on the ground floor.

“A sewing-machine for Miss Gordon,” said a somewhat gruff voice.

“No, that cannot be. There is some mistake,” said Mary’s gentle tones. And then Syl sprang forward, in a flutter of excitement, which would have been pretty to see had there been anybody there to notice it.

“I’m sure it’s all right. Bring it in, please; and Mary, you will tell them where to put it, in the best light.”

And in five minutes or less it was all in its place, and Mary was looking, with eyes full of wonder, and something else beside wonder, at Syl Graham.

“It’s nothing,” said Syl hurriedly; “it’s only my New Year’s present to you, a little in advance of time.”

She had thought she should enjoy Mary’s surprise; but this was something she had not looked for,—this utter breaking down, these great wild sobs, as if the girl’s heart would break. And when she could speak at length, she cried with a sort of passion,—

“O Miss Syl, I do believe you have saved my mother’s life! She will get better—she must—now that I can stay here all the time and take care of her.”

Syl was glad to get out into the street. She felt something in her own throat choking her. Just a few steps off she met Dr. Meade,—her own doctor, as it chanced,—and it struck her that it would be a good thing if he would go in to see Mrs. Gordon. So she asked him.

“I’m going there,” he said. “I try to see her once every week.”

“And will she live—can she?”

The doctor answered, with half a sigh,—

“I’m afraid not. She needs more constant care, and more nourishing food and other things. I wish I could help her more, but I can only give my services, and I see so many such cases.”

“But she would take things from you, and not be hurt?”

“I should make her if I had a full purse to go to.”

“Well, then, here are forty dollars for her; and you are to get her what she needs, and never let her know where it came from—will you?”

“Yes, I will,” he answered earnestly. And then, after a moment, he said,—“Syl Graham, you are your mother’s daughter. I can say no better thing of you,—she was a good woman.”

Syl had a hundred dollars left; but that wouldn’t compass the pomegranate silk, and Syl had concluded now she did not want it. She had had a glimpse of something better; and that hundred dollars would make many a sad heart glad before spring.

On New Year’s Day, Papa Graham was off all day making calls; and the gas was already lighted when he went into his own house, and into his own drawing-room. He saw a girl there with bands of bright chestnut hair about her graceful young head; with shining eyes, and lips as bright as the vivid crimson roses in her braided hair, and in the bosom of her black silk gown. He looked at her with a fond pride and a fonder love; and then he bent to kiss her,—for the room was empty of guests just then. As he lifted his head and met Aunt Rachel’s eyes, it happened that he said about the same words Dr. Meade had used before,—

“She is her mother’s daughter; I can say of her no better thing.”