CHAPTER I.

_AT THE MILL._

"POLLIE, why have you not cleared up those weeds?" asked Pollie's mother from the mill door.

Pollie was sitting in the fork of the old apple-tree, with her head bending over a book.

She raised it a little, and allowed her voice just to go round the corner of her sun-bonnet and no more, "I forgot, mother."

"I wish you did not forget so often, my dear," said her mother. "Your life is a string of forgets."

Pollie's head went down again, but a frown settled on her pretty face.

She did wish that her mother would let her be, and not always be finding out things she had not done. Her Aunt Elizabeth did not find so much amiss with Laura or Clara; nor, for the matter of that, did her own mother seem to rebuke her brother Jim half as much as she did her.

She wished she could live with Aunt Elizabeth, then she would be able to do just as she liked. Aunt Elizabeth would say, "Pollie, my dear, would you get so-and-so for me?" or, "Pollie, my dear, I want you and Laura to go for a message, will you?"

It was much pleasanter than "Pollie, put on your hat and go down to your Uncle Brown's!"

"I say," called Jim, breaking in on this reverie, "where's the hoe? Father's been looking for it for ever so long, and I said I knew you had had it last."

"I forgot to put it away," said Pollie. "It is by the waterbutt. Just get it for him, Jim."

"Not I," said Jim, walking away down the steep path. "You must go and get it for him."

Pollie got down quickly. If ever she did anything willingly, it was for her father!

"Eh, my little girl," he said, "this is like you. To think you should have wasted ten minutes of my time, and there it was behind the butt all the while!"

He drew it out from its hiding-place with some difficulty; it would stick against the brick wall.

"How did it get here?" he asked patiently.

"It fell down behind, and I didn't stay to pull it out," said Pollie.

"Did you never stop to think that whatsoever your hand findeth to do should be done with your might, eh, Pollie?"

"No, father."

"I have, many's the time," said the miller, "and those sort of hindrances aren't hindrances at all. They bring you into contact with your Lord, and I know nothing better than that for helping you along with your work!"

Pollie did not answer. She did not mind hearing her father talk so, at least, not much. But if it had been her mother, she would have flown off and not have heard half of it.

So she went back to her apple-tree and opened her book once more, but she was not to be left in peace.

"Pollie!" came from the mill door. "Pollie!"

"Yes, mother."

"Come right in and set the tea. I told you that when you heard the wheels of your father's cart you were to come right in, and I was out at the back and didn't notice. Your father's been home this quarter, I do believe, and the tea isn't ready."

"I forgot, mother," said Pollie ungraciously. "I'd have come if you had called me."

Her mother went back to her work, and Pollie hastened in. That her father should be made uncomfortable did not suit her at all. But though she knew her tiresomeness made her mother uncomfortable, she told herself that she certainly could not help that.

She set about getting the tea with a will, however. And as she was a very capable girl, it did not take long before she was standing at the mill door again, clapping her hands as a sign that her father and brother were to come in.

Jim and she were not always the best of friends. Her faults lay in one direction, Jim's in another.

If Pollie forgot too often, Jim did not forget often enough. He was always reminding people of things which were not done, and especially remembered all his sister's delinquencies, and pointed them out ruthlessly.

"How late tea is!" he remarked as they sat down.

His mother looked up and said, "Yes it is; Pollie forgot to come in."

Pollie crimsoned, for she had bustled about so heartily that it was but little after the usual time.

Her father's words, however, brought sudden tears into her eyes, which she would have given something to stop.

"Say instead, Jim, 'how nicely somebody has got our tea for us!'"

"It's Poll's duty," persisted Jim. "I don't see that she deserves any praise."

"How did a son of mine feel just now, when I told him that he had put that hay away very cleverly?"

Jim's eyes went down, and there was silence for a moment.

"I could do all Poll's duties and my own too, if she were not here," he remarked presently.

"Perhaps you'll have to," said his mother a little dryly, though there was a smile in her eyes.

"How?" asked Jim, too astounded to say more.

"You will find that you cannot do quite all. But as the holidays are coming, I am going to spare Pollie to visit her aunt Elizabeth. You will be at home all day to help me, and a change will do Pollie good."

Pollie turned hot and cold. Did her mother really mean it? But her mother was not apt to say things which she did not mean. And if she meant it, why had she not told her quietly by herself, instead of announcing such a piece of news to Jim.

She felt very bitter, and said to herself that the pleasure of going was quite spoilt by the way in which she had been told.

"Should you like it, Mary?" her mother said kindly.

"Yes, mother, very much, if—"

"If what, my dear?"

"If—if you do not want me, and if—" then she burst into tears and sobbing out something about Jim being so unkind, burst from the room.

"What is this, Jim?" asked their mother.

"Nothing at all," said Jim. "I haven't said a word to her but what you heard. She's a stupid cry-baby!"

Their mother could not suppose that Pollie could take to heart the chance words of her brother, quite two years her junior, and looking after her daughter rather soberly, she met her husband's eyes.

"She'll be better for a little change," he said, with that tenderness which all their lives had been 'just father' to the children. "My poor little Pollie wants one thing, and until she has that, her heart cannot be at rest."

"What's that, father?" asked Jim curiously. "I think Pollie has the best of everything—"

"She needs Jesus," he said softly, as he rose and pushed back his chair, "and I am praying every day that she may find Him."

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