CHAPTER III.

A Dinner-Party.

TOM FAIRLEY arose in the morning perfectly free from fever, and the doctor, when he came in the forenoon, said that the boy would soon be as well as ever, and that in one or two days, should the weather continue warm, he and his little sister might take a turn in the garden.

"A turn in the garden indeed," muttered Tom, as soon as the doctor had left the room, "it's not there that I'm going, to trot up and down the stupid gravel walks, or make daisy-chains like a baby. Susan, you shall take us to the toy-shop in the town, and there we will spend all our money, and buy lots of pretty things, and sweeties besides, and make ourselves jolly."

The boy finished his sentence by spinning his crown-piece on the table, amusing himself by watching the round half-transparent silver globe which it seemed to form, till the motion given by his fingers became less rapid, and gradually the globe rattled down into its natural form, and lay as a piece of money on the table.

Susan waited till the noise of the spinning was over, and then quietly observed, "I am afraid, Master Tom, that a long time must pass before it will be right for you and your sister to shop in the town."

"Why, mamma often takes us there," said the boy.

"Remember that for weeks, if not months, there will be a risk of your giving the fever to any one whom you meet. You carry infection with you."

"Oh, hang the infection!" exclaimed Tom, angrily. "I don't mean to be shut up like a wild beast in a cage." And the boy looked so fierce as he said this that he seemed to have enough of the wild beast about him to render the cage a somewhat desirable thing.

"No one will guess that we have had any fever at all," observed Jessy, who, while better tempered than her brother, was less straightforward and open. "See—there are no marks left; and if you are not so cross as to tell, no one will know that anything has been the matter with Tom or with me."

"Oh, Miss Jessy, your own conscience would know it; your own conscience would whisper, 'Is it right, for my own selfish pleasure, to run the risk of carrying sickness, and perhaps even death, into some happy home? If I should hear of some poor child catching the fever and dying, could I ever feel happy again?'"

Jessy stared at Susan in surprise. The idea of being guided by the secret voice of conscience in her heart was new to the child, who had hitherto cared only to follow self-will.

Tom broke out abruptly with the question, "As you make such a mighty fuss about infection, Susan, are you not afraid of catching the fever yourself? I wonder that you don't run away in a fright, like mamma with the baby."

"It was your mamma's duty to go; it is my duty to stay," replied the young nursery-maid, with a smile. "I am not in the least afraid, for I trust in God who careth for me."

"Do you mean that because you trust in God, He will keep you from catching the fever?" asked Jessy.

"I did not mean that," replied Susan. "God sometimes lets His people have troubles, and sickness is often one of them; but He helps and cheers His servants in distress, and brings them out of it at last. God teaches them sweet lessons of patience and hope and faith, so that every tried Christian will be able to say, sooner or later, 'It is good for me that I have been afflicted.' * If we trust in God, King David's beautiful words may be ours, 'I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me;' † for the Lord will either keep trials away, or He will, by His power and love, turn the trials themselves into blessings."

* Psalm cxix. 71. † Psalm xxiii. 4.

The Fairleys would have cared nothing for teaching on the subject of religion from one whose conduct did not show its power over herself; but Susan lived as she tried to teach the children to live, and therefore her words had some influence. Tom and Jessy could see that she who feared God had no other fear, and that while caring for others, she could, with happy trust, leave the care of herself unto Him. This was the children's first lesson of faith in a watchful Providence.

Susan had a good deal to try her temper during the rest of that day. The Fairleys, like most children when recovering from illness, were very impatient and cross; they would not bear contradiction, they quarrelled, they broke their toys, they tore their books, they grumbled against the doctor who kept them in-doors when they chose to go out. Susan came in for a large share of their rudeness; but she was quiet and patient, never returned a cross word, and did all that she could to give pleasure to those who seemed resolved not to be pleased.

Dinner in some degree restored the Fairleys to good humour. After being kept for some days on low diet, the children were very hungry, and keenly enjoyed their meal.

As Tom was finishing a leg of chicken after having eaten a wing, he abruptly stopped, struck the handle of his knife and fork upon the table, and exclaimed, as a thought suddenly arose in his mind, "I hope all this nonsense about infection has not made mamma put off my birthday party!"

He looked Susan full in the face as he spoke, and her silence was answer sufficient.

Knife and fork were flung to the other end of the table, Tom started to his feet in a violent fury, and Jessy burst into tears.

It was some time before Susan could gain a hearing. The birthday party had been looked forward to with delight; the Fairleys were very little accustomed to disappointment, and knew not how to bear it. Gradually, however, the storm lulled a little, and Susan was able to suggest a few thoughts of comfort. The children should have a birthday feast after all, she would ask Mason the cook for a little flour, eggs, and strawberry jam, she would show Tom and Jessy how to make pastry themselves, and that would be far better fun than having it up from the kitchen, or from a confectioner's shop.

Jessy dried her eyes, listened and smiled; the child was accustomed to the pleasure of eating pastry, but the pleasure of helping to make it was something entirely new. Tom's passion subsided into sulky ill-humour, as he sat balancing his crown-piece on his thumb, then throwing it up and catching it again.

"What's the use of having a feast with no guests to eat it?" muttered the boy. "And what's the use of having money when one is not able to spend it?"

"Well, Master Tom," said Susan, gaily, "if you can't tell what to do with your money, I know a famous way in which you could spend it; and if you want guests, I know how you can get as many as you please to invite."

"You do—do you?" cried the boy, with eager surprise.

"It happens," said Susan, "that my dear mother's birthday falls on the same day as yours, and I have been intending, for some time past, to give a feast to four children in honour of the day."

"You—a nursery-maid!" exclaimed Tom Fairley. "And pray, does mamma know what you are after?"

"Oh! No," replied Susan, smiling, "no one knows but myself; but perhaps, if you are very good, I may let you into my secret?"

"But you've no business to invite any one into our house," cried Tom, in an insolent tone. "It would be a pretty joke indeed if you could have friends here, when we are not allowed to have one."

"My guests will not eat their dinner here," replied Susan. "I shall send it for them in so clever a way that all the four dinners could be easily packed up in my thimble."

"Your thimble! Oh! What do you mean—what can you mean?" cried both the Fairleys in a breath.

And Jessy added, with a merry little laugh, "I don't think that such a feast as yours would feed a hungry mouse."

"Ah! Missie, you are quite mistaken there," cried Susan, amused at the children's looks of surprise. "My guests shall have right good cheer. Would you like to know what fare will be provided?"

"Let's hear all about it," said Tom.

"What would you think of meat, potatoes, rice, and onions made up into a nice Irish stew, and a good slice of bread into the bargain? Each of my guests will have this."

"I say!" exclaimed the astonished Tom, dropping his money in his surprise. "And can that—meat, onions and all—go into your thimble?"

"Not exactly the dinner itself, but the dinner price," replied Susan. "And one good thing about my feast is this—I am quite sure that my little guests will be pleased, not one will go grumbling away. They will most likely not have tasted meat for a whole week before, and will enjoy their hot Irish stew as much, perhaps more, than you, Master Tom, did your chicken."

"I don't like riddles," cried the boy, impatiently. "Who are these hungry guests of yours? And how can you have them to dinner? Just tell us straight out what you mean."

Susan was pleased at the opportunity of explaining to her young listeners the simple but beautiful arrangements of the DESTITUTE CHILDREN'S DINNER SOCIETY, * by which a half-starved boy or girl from the miserable dens of London is provided with an excellent meal for threepence, bringing a single penny in addition. She spoke of the poor little ragged wanderers who have never in their lives known what it is to have a comfortable home, nor perhaps—till this charity was begun—a really satisfying meal.

* See "Ragged School Magazine" for February 1868.

Susan had been in London with an uncle who kept a cook-shop. She told how it made her heart ache to see pale, thin, barefooted children hovering round the place to smell the savoury scent which to them must have been so tantalising, and to gaze through the windows at the tempting food which they might not taste. Susan did not say how often she had stinted herself in her meals that she might give to those who needed.

"I was thankful," said Susan, "to find that God had put it into the hearts of the wise and good to feed these poor hungry lambs, and in a way so simple and easy that even a servant girl can help a little in the work."

"How will you do it, how will you send your dinners," asked Jessy, "when you live so far-away from London?"

"Twelve postage stamps can be bought for one shilling; I will put twelve stamps into a letter, and direct it to Mr. Gent, 1 Exeter Hall, Strand, London. I will merely write inside, 'For children's dinners, from a cheerful giver.' And then, when my letter is dropped into the post-box, I know that it is all the same as if I had sent off four invitations to dinner. I am sure that four pairs of eyes will look brighter, and four young hearts will be merrier, and I shall enjoy my own meals a great deal more when I think of my poor little guests."

"Why, I could have a dinner-party of twenty for my five shillings!" exclaimed Tom, who had picked up his silver crown-piece. "Mamma never asks more than a dozen at a time, and I am sure that the feasting them costs her a lot of money, for I've heard her talking to papa about the dreadful long bills."

"I think that I'll get you to change my big piece of money into five shillings, Susan," said Jessy, "and take one of them for stamps, and send my stamps with yours, and then there will be eight hungry children feasted, and two 'cheerful givers,' you know."

The eyes of Susan glistened. It was not so much that she was glad that the hungry should be fed, but that she rejoiced at having been the means of giving to her young charge this first lesson in Christian love. It was for this, and for this alone, that Susan had mentioned to any one her own intended deed of kindness. She felt that she could in no way teach so well as by her own example; the children might be quick to imitate, though they would be slow to obey.

"You'll not have any of my money for your dirty, ragged beggar-boys," said Tom, laughing, as he chucked up his crown-piece again. "I'll not spend it on mutton, potatoes, and onions, or pack up twenty hot dinners in a letter. I know what I'll do, since this stupid infection won't let me go to the town. I'll ask Giles to go shopping for me; he shall buy me a top, a whip, some string, and all sorts of things that I fancy."

Jessy came up smiling to the nursery-maid, and slipped her crown-piece into Susan's hand. "I can't cut this into five bits, you know, but you will get Giles to change it, and buy the twelve stamps for the dinners."

Susan took the money with a thoughtful air.

"Are you not pleased?" asked Jessy.

"I was just thinking," observed Susan, "that it would never do to pack up infection in the paper."

"Could you do that?" cried Tom in surprise. "I never heard of anything like this horrid infection!"

"I know of one thing that is like it," said Susan, gravely, "the infection of a sinful example. Evil spreads from one soul to another, as fever from person to person. Oh! How grievous it would be by one's works or one's words to give something far worse than any sickness to those whom we love."

"I suppose," observed Tom, "that bad men are shut up in prison that they mayn't infect other people with their wicked example."

"There are many who do harm in that way, whom no one would think of shutting up," replied Susan. "The selfish, the idle, the worldly, the proud, may be spreading the infection of their faults around them, and yet their company may be thought very good, and not dangerous in the least. No one would willingly take a fever, but how many willingly take bad advice, and follow an evil example."

"But what is to be done about the dinners?" interrupted Jessy. "It would never do to pack up scarlet fever with potatoes and mutton."

Susan considered for a moment or two. "Giles seems very good-natured," she observed. "Perhaps he would kindly take the trouble of not only buying the stamps, but putting them up in the letter!"

"That will do famously," cried Jessy.

Susan then removed the cloth from the table, and carried away the plates and dishes. The heart of the young maid warmed towards her little charge.

"I doubt that my dear young lady ever before thought of helping the needy," reflected Susan, "and now she does so simply from kindness of heart; she knows nothing yet of mercy to the poor, shown as a proof of grateful love to the Lord. But it is well to make a beginning," said Susan to herself, as she carried the tray downstairs. "The time may come when Jessy will delight in doing good, with the means and power to do much, such as I never will have.

"Ah! The tiniest spark that glimmers in a night-light may kindle a very large fire, or a beacon that will be seen for many miles round! Who knows but that, by God's blessing, a poor nursery-maid's simple teaching may be the means of drawing children's hearts to the Lord; and that these children, in future days, may be burning and shining lights, so as both by their words and works to glorify their Father in Heaven!"