NETTIE'S GARRET.

Nettie's attic grew to be a good place to her. She never heard the least sound of rats; and it was so nicely out of the way. Barry never came up there, and there she could not even hear the voices of her father and Mr. Lumber. She had a tired time of it down stairs.

That first afternoon was a good specimen of the way things went on. Nettie's mornings were always spent at school; Mrs. Mathieson would have that, as she said, whether she could get along without Nettie or no. From the time Nettie got home till she went to bed, she was as busy as she could be. There was so much bread to make, and so much beef and pork to boil, and so much washing of pots and kettles; and at meal times there were very often cakes to fry, besides all the other preparations. Mr. Mathieson seemed to have made up his mind that his lodger's rent should all go to the table and be eaten up immediately; but the difficulty was to make as much as he expected of it in that line; for now he brought none of his own earnings home, and Mrs. Mathieson had more than a sad guess where they went. By degrees he came to be very little at home in the evenings, and he carried off Barry with him. Nettie saw her mother burdened with a great outward and inward care at once, and stood in the breach all she could. She worked to the extent of her strength, and beyond it, in the endless getting and clearing away of meals; and watching every chance, when the men were out of the way, she would coax her mother to sit down and read a chapter in her Testament. "It will rest you so, mother," Nettie would say; "and I will make the bread just as soon as I get the dishes done. Do let me! I like to do it."

Sometimes Mrs. Mathieson could not be persuaded; sometimes she would yield, in a despondent kind of way, and sit down with her Testament and look at it as if neither there nor anywhere else in the universe could she find rest or comfort any more.

"It don't signify, child," she said, one afternoon when Nettie had been urging her to sit down and read. "I haven't the heart to do anything. We're all driving to rack and ruin just as fast as we can go."

"Oh no, mother!" said Nettie. "I don't think we are."

"I am sure of it. I see it coming every day. Every day it is a little worse; and Barry is going along with your father; and they are destroying me among them, body and soul too."

"No, mother," said Nettie, "I don't think that. I have prayed the Lord Jesus, and you know he has promised to hear prayer; and I know we are not going to ruin."

"You are not, child, I believe; but you are the only one of us that isn't. I wish I was dead, to be out of my misery!"

"Sit down, mother, and read a little bit; and don't talk so. Do, mother! It will be an hour and more yet to supper, and I'll get it ready. You sit down and read, and I'll make the shortcakes. Do, mother! and you'll feel better."

It was half despair and half persuasion that made her do it; but Mrs. Mathieson did sit down by the open window and take her Testament; and Nettie flew quietly about, making her shortcakes and making up the fire and setting the table, and through it all casting many a loving glance over to the open book in her mother's hand and the weary, stony face that was bent over it. Nettie had not said how her own back was aching, and she forgot it almost in her business and her thoughts; though by the time her work was done her head was aching wearily too. But cakes and table and fire and everything else were in readiness; and Nettie stole up behind her mother and leaned over her shoulder; leaned a little heavily.[1] "Don't that chapter comfort you, mother?" she whispered.

"No. It don't seem to me as I've got any feeling left," said Mrs. Mathieson. It was the fourth chapter of John at which they were both looking.

"Don't it comfort you to read of Jesus being wearied?" Nettie went on, her head lying on her mother's shoulder.

"Why should it, child?"

"I like to read it," said Nettie. "Then I know he knows how I feel sometimes."

"God knows everything, Nettie."

"Yes, mother; but then Jesus felt it. 'He took our infirmities.' And oh, mother, don't you love that tenth verse?—and the thirteenth and fourteenth?"

Mrs. Mathieson looked at it, silently; then she said, "I don't rightly understand it, Nettie. I suppose I ought to do so,—but I don't."

"Why, mother! I understand it. It means, that if Jesus makes you happy, you'll never be unhappy again. 'Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst,'—don't you see, mother? 'Shall never thirst,'—he will have enough, and be satisfied." "How do you know it, Nettie?" her mother asked, in a puzzled kind of way.

"I know it, mother, because Jesus has given that living water to me."

"He never gave it to me," said Mrs. Mathieson, in the same tone.

"But he will, mother. Look up there—oh, how I love that tenth verse!—'If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.' See, mother,—he will give, if we ask."

"And do you feel so, Nettie?—that you have enough, and are satisfied with your life every day?"

"Yes, mother," Nettie said, quietly; "I am very happy. I am happy all the time; because I think that Jesus is with me everywhere; when I'm upstairs, and when I'm busy here, and when I'm at school, and when I go to the spring; and all times. And that makes me very happy."

"And don't you wish for anything you haven't got?" said her mother. "Yes, one thing," said Nettie. "I just wish that you and father and Barry may be so happy too; and I believe that's coming; for I've prayed the Lord, and I believe he will give it to me. I want it for other people too. I often think, when I am looking at somebody, of those words—'If thou knewest the gift of God, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.'"

With that, Mrs. Mathieson cast down her book and burst into such a passion of weeping that Nettie was frightened. It was like the breaking up of an icy winter. She flung her apron over her head and sobbed aloud; till hearing the steps of the men upon the staircase she rushed off to Barry's room, and presently got quiet, for she came out to supper as if nothing had happened.

From that time there was a gentler mood upon her mother, Nettie saw; though she looked weary and careworn as ever, there was not now often the hard, dogged look which had been wont to be there for months past. Nettie had no difficulty to get her to read the Testament; and of all things, what she liked was to get a quiet hour of an evening alone with Nettie and hear her sing hymns. But both Nettie and she had a great deal, as Mrs. Mathieson said, "to put up with."

As weeks went on, the father of the family was more and more out at nights, and less and less agreeable when he was at home. He and his friend Lumber helped each other in mischief: they went together to Jackson's shop and spent time in lounging and gossiping and talking politics there; and what was worse, they made the time and the politics go down with draughts of liquor. Less and less money came to Mrs. Mathieson's hand; but her husband always required what he called a good meal to be ready for him and his lodger whenever he came home, and made no difference in his expectations whether he had provided the means or not. The lodger's rent and board had been at first given for the household daily expenses; but then Mr. Mathieson began to pay over a smaller sum, saying that it was all that was due; and Mrs. Mathieson suspected that the rest had been paid away already for brandy. Then Mr. Mathieson told her to trade at Jackson's on account, and he would settle the bill. Mrs. Mathieson held off from this as long as it was possible. She and Nettie did their very best to make the little that was given them go a good way; they wasted not a crumb nor a penny, and did not spend on themselves what they really wanted; that they might not have the fearful storm of anger which was sure to come if the dinner was not plentiful and the supper did not please the taste of Mr. Mathieson and his lodger. By degrees it came to be very customary for Mrs. Mathieson and Nettie to make their meal of porridge and bread, after all the more savoury food had been devoured by the others; and many a weary patch and darn filled the night hours because they had not money to buy a cheap dress or two. Nettie bore it very patiently. Mrs. Mathieson was sometimes impatient.

"This wont last me through the week, to get the things you want," she said one Saturday to her husband, when he gave her what he said was Lumber's payment to him.

"You'll have to make it last," said he, gruffly.

"Will you tell me how I'm going to do that? Here isn't more than half what you gave me at first."

"Send to Jackson's for what you want!" he roared at her; "didn't I tell you so? and don't come bothering me with your noise."

"When will you pay Jackson?"

"I'll pay you first!" he said, with an oath, and very violently. It was a ruder word than he had ever said to her before, and Mrs. Mathieson was staggered for a moment by it; but there was another word she was determined to say.

"You may do what you like to me," she said, doggedly; "but I should think you would see for yourself that Nettie has too much to get along with. She is getting just as thin and pale as she can be."

"That's just your fool's nonsense!" said Mr. Mathieson; but he spoke it more quietly. Nettie just then entered the room. "Here, Nettie, what ails you? Come here. Let's look at you. Aint you as strong as ever you was? Here's your mother says you're getting puny."

Nettie's smile and answer were so placid and untroubled, and the little colour that rose in her cheeks at her father's question made her look so fresh and well, that he was quieted. He drew her to his arms, for his gentle dutiful little daughter had a place in his respect and affection both, though he did not often show it very broadly; but now he kissed her.

"There!" said he; "don't you go to growing thin and weak without telling me, for I don't like such doings. You tell me when you want anything." But with that, Mr. Mathieson got up and went off, out of the house; and Nettie had small chance to tell him if she wanted anything. However, this little word and kiss were a great comfort and pleasure to her. It was the last she had from him in a good while.

Nettie, however, was not working for praise or kisses, and very little of either she got. Generally her father was rough, imperious, impatient, speaking fast enough if anything went wrong, but very sparing in expressions of pleasure. Sometimes a blessing did come upon her from the very depth of Mrs. Mathieson's heart, and went straight to Nettie's; but it was for another blessing she laboured, and prayed, and waited.

So weeks went by. So her patient little feet went up and down the stairs with pails of water from the spring; and her hands made bread and baked cakes, and set rooms in order; and it was Nettie always who went to Mr. Jackson's for meal and treacle, and to Mrs. Auguste's, the little Frenchwoman's, as she was called, for a loaf when they were now and then out of bread. And with her mornings spent at school, Nettie's days were very busy ones; and the feet that at night mounted the steps to her attic room were aching and tired enough. All the more that now Nettie and her mother lived half the the time on porridge; all the provision they dared make of other things being quite consumed by the three hearty appetites that were before them at the meal. And Nettie's appetite was not at all hearty, and sometimes she could hardly eat at all.

As the summer passed away it began to grow cold, too, up in her garret. Nettie had never thought of that. As long as the summer sun warmed the roof well in the day, and only the soft summer wind played in and out of her window at night, it was all very well; and Nettie thought her sleeping-chamber was the best in the whole house, for it was nearest the sky. But August departed with its sunny days, and September grew cool at evening; and October brought still sunny days, it is true, but the nights had a clear sharp frost in them; and Nettie was obliged to cover herself up warm in bed and look at the moonlight and the stars as she could see them through the little square opening left by the shutter. The stars looked very lovely to Nettie, when they peeped at her so, in her bed, out of their high heaven; and she was very content.

Then came November; and the winds began to come into the garret, not only through the open window, but through every crack between two boards. The whole garret was filled with the winds, Nettie thought. It was hard managing then. Shutting the shutter would bar out the stars, but not the wind, she found; and to keep from being quite chilled through at her times of prayer morning and evening, Nettie used to take the blanket and coverlets from the bed and wrap herself in them. It was all she could do. Still, she forgot the inconveniences; and her little garret chamber seemed to Nettie very near heaven, as well as near the sky.

But all this way of life did not make her grow strong, nor rosy; and though Nettie never told her father that she wanted anything, her mother's heart measured the times when it ought to be told.