Hepsie's Christmas Visit

BY

MAUD MADDICK

 'I say, little mother,' said Hepsie, as she tucked her hand under Mrs. Erldon's arm, and hurried her along the snowy path from the old church door, 'I say--I've been thinking what a jolly and dear old world this is, and if only the people in it were a little bit nicer, why, there wouldn't be a thing to grumble at, would there?'

Mrs. Erldon turned her rather sad, but sweet face towards her little daughter, and smiled at her.

Somehow folks often did smile at Hepsie. She was such a breezy brisk sort of child, and had a way of looking at life in general that was distinctly interesting.

'Of course, dearie,' she went on, in that protecting little manner Hepsie loved to adopt when talking to her beloved mother, 'you can't imagine I am thinking of people like you. If every one were half--no--a quarter as delightful as you, the world would be charming. Oh dear no, I am not flattering at all, I am just speaking the truth; but there aren't many of your kind about, as I find out more and more every day.'

'My dearest of little girls,' interrupted her mother, as they turned into Sunnycoombe Lane, where the snow lay crisply shining, and the trees were flecked with that dainty tracing of frozen white, 'you look at me through glasses of love, and they have a knack of painting a person as fair as you wish that one to be. Supposing you give the rest of the world a little of their benefit, Hepsie mine!'

An Unruly Member

Hepsie flung back her head, and laughed lightly. 'Oh, you artful little mother! That's your gentle way of telling me, what, of course, I know--that I am a horrid girl for impatience and temper, when I get vexed; but you know, mother darling, I shall never be able to manage my tongue. It was born too long, and though on this very Christmas morning I have been making ever so many good resolutions to keep the tiresome thing in order--you mark my words, little mother, if it doesn't run off in some dreadful way directly it gets the chance--and then you'll be grieved--and I shall be sorry--and some one or other will be _in a rage_!'

Mrs. Erldon drew in her lips. It was hard to keep from laughing at the comical look on the little girl's face, and certainly what she said was true. Some one was very often in a rage with Hepsie's tongue. It was a most outspoken and unruly member, and yet belonged to the best-hearted child in the whole of Sunnycoombe, and the favourite, too, in spite of her temper, which was so quickly over, and her repentance always so sincere and sweet.

She was looking up into Mrs. Erldon's face now with great honest blue eyes in which a faint shadow could be seen.

'I met my grandfather this morning,' she said in a quick, rather nervous voice, 'and I told him he was a wicked old man!'

Her mother turned so white that Hepsie thought she was going to faint, and hung on to her arm in terror and remorse.

'Don't look like that!' she burst forth desperately. 'I know I ought to be shaken, and ought to be ashamed of myself--but it's no use--I'm not either one or the other, only I wish I hadn't done it now, because I've vexed you on Christmas morning!'

Mrs. Erldon walked along, looking straight ahead.

'DO FORGIVE ME, MOTHER DARLING!'

'I'd rather you did shake me,' said Hepsie, in a quivering tone, 'only you couldn't do such a thing, I know. You're too kind--and I'm always saying something I shouldn't. Do forgive me, mother darling! You can't think what a relief it was to me to speak like that to my grandfather, who thinks he's all the world, and something more, just because he's the Lord of the Manor and got a hateful heap of money, and it'll do him good (when he's got over his rage) to feel that there's his own little granddaughter who isn't afraid of him and tells him the truth----'

'Hepsie!'

Hepsie paused, and stared. Her gentle mother was gazing so strangely and sternly at her.

'You are speaking of my father, Hepsie,' she said quietly, but in a voice new to her child, though it was still gentle and low, 'and in treating him with disrespect you have hurt me deeply.'

'Oh, but mother--darling, darling mother,' cried the child, with tears springing to her beautiful eyes, 'I wouldn't hurt you for a million wicked old grandfathers! I'd rather let him do anything he liked that was bad to me, but what I can't stand is his making you sad and unhappy, and making poor daddy go right away again to that far-away place in South Africa, which he never need have done if it hadn't been for being poor, though he must be finding money now, or he couldn't send you those lovely furs, and----'

'Oh, Hepsie, Hepsie, that little tongue, how it gallops along! Be quiet at once, and listen to me! There, dear, I can't bear to see tears in your eyes on Christmas Day, and when you and I are just the two together on this day--your father so many, many miles distant from us, and poor grandfather nursing his anger all alone in the big old house.'

Her tone was full of a deep sorrow, and for once, young as she was, Hepsie understood that here was an emotion upon which she must not remark, though she muttered in her own heart:

'All through his own wicked old temper.'

Mrs. Erldon took Hepsie's hand in her own as they walked towards the little home at the end of the long country lane.

Mrs. Erldon Explains

'I will not scold you, my darling,' she said; 'but in future never forget that God Himself commands that we shall honour our parents, and even if they grieve their children, Hepsie, that does not do away with children's duty, and a parent is a parent as long as life lasts--to be honoured and--loved! You are twelve years old, dear, and big enough now to understand how sad I am that my dear old father will not forgive me for marrying your father, and I think I had better explain things a little to you, Hepsie. There was some one--a rich cousin--whom my father had always hoped and wished that I should marry as soon as I was old enough; but when I was twenty-one, and was travelling with grandfather, you know, that is my own father--we made the acquaintance of a gentleman in South Africa--Alfred Erldon--who was of English parentage, but had lived out there all his life. Well, Hepsie, I need only say that this gentleman and I decided to marry against grandfather's desire. We were married in Johannesburg, to his great displeasure, so he refused to have anything to do with us, and returned to England, declaring he would never speak to me again.

'I never thought that he really meant such a thing, he had always loved me so dearly, and I loved him so much. I wrote again and again, but there was no answer to any of my letters. Then, my darling, you were born, and soon after, the great South African War broke out, and your dear father made me leave Johannesburg and bring you to England. Of course, I came to the old home--Sunnycoombe--but only to find I was still unforgiven, for the letter I sent to say I was in the village was not answered either, humbly as I begged my father to see me. All the same, Hepsie, I have remained here at your father's wish, for he lost money, and had to 'trek north,' as they say, to a wild part of Rhodesia, where white women could not go.'

Mrs. Erldon's tears were nearly falling as she added: 'Things have gone badly with him, and only once has he been able to come to England to spend a few months with us, as you remember, five years ago, but soon, now you are older, I shall go and face the life, however rough it may be. Now, no more talk, for here we are, darling, and, please God, this may be the last Christmas that we spend without daddy, in England or Africa, as it may be.'

'And I won't grieve you again to-day, darling little mother,' whispered Hepsie, quite sobered at the thought of mother without either her daddy or Hepsie's on Christmas Day again, and no letter from Africa by the usual mail.

An Afternoon Call

It was a glorious afternoon, and when Mrs. Erldon settled down for a rest, Hepsie asked if she might go out for a run, to which her mother at once agreed. In this quiet little peaceful spot in Somersetshire there was no reason why a girl of Hepsie's age should not run about freely, and so, warmly wrapped up, the child trotted off--but any one watching her small determined face would have seen that this was not an ordinary walk upon her part.

She left the old lane and turned towards a different part of Sunnycoombe. She approached the big Manor House through its wide gates, and along broad paths of well-trimmed trees. As she did so Hepsie breathed a little more quickly than usual, while a brilliant colour stole into her fair young cheeks.

'When one does wrong,' she murmured determinedly, 'there is only one thing to follow--and that is to put the wrong right, if one can. I spoke rudely to my darling little mother's own father, and though he's a terrible old man, he's got to have an apology, which is a wretched thing to have to give; and he's got to hear that his daughter never would and never did teach her little girl to be rude, no, not even to a cantankerous old grandfather, who won't speak to a lovely sweet woman like my mother.'

She reached the porch, and pulled fiercely at the old-fashioned bell, then fairly jumped at the loud clanging noise that woke the silence of the quiet afternoon.

The door opened so suddenly that Hepsie was quite confused, and for the moment took the stately old butler for her grandfather himself, offered her hand, and then turned crimson.

'Good gracious me!' she said in her brisk voice. 'Do you stand behind the door all day? You made me jump so that I don't know what I am saying, but--well--I must see my grandfather at once, please.'

Every one in the village knew all about the child and who she was, and the man was more than surprised at seeing her dare to come there, and he also felt very nervous.

'You run away, miss,' he said in a confidential whisper, 'an' more's the shame I should have to say so, but, bless your heart, the master wouldn't see you, and it's more than I dare to tell him you're wanting.'

'You need not trouble,' Hepsie said; 'if I had not made a big resolution to look after my tongue, I should say more than you would enjoy hearing--talking to a lady (who comes to visit your master on Christmas Day) like you are doing to me; not that you may not mean kindly, now I come to think of it, but meaning goes for nothing, my good man, if you do a wrong thing, and you can't tell me that you are the one to decide whom your master will see or not.' She waited to take a breath, while the man rubbed his white hair in great perplexity, and feeling rather breathless himself; but Hepsie calmly walked by him, and before he could recover from the shock, he saw her disappear into the dining-room!

Hepsie never forgot that moment.

Seated at a long table was a solitary and lonely-looking figure, supporting one thin old cheek on his hand as he rested his elbow on the table and seemed to be gazing far away into space. She did not know that he was rather deaf, and had not heard her enter, and she stood and looked at him, with her heart aching in a funny sort of way, she thought, for the sake of a wicked old man.

She stared and stared, and the more she stared, the bigger a lump in her throat seemed to become. The room was so quiet and he sat so still, and something in his face brought that of her mother to her mind.

At last she walked right up to him, and, feeling if she did not get out the words quickly she never would, Hepsie stretched out her hand and said: 'When I stopped you in the lane to-day, I didn't know how much mother still loved you, and I forgot all about honouring parents, however unkind they seem, or I shouldn't have told you what I did, however true it was, for I hurt mother shockingly, as any one could see, and I've promised to look after my tongue much better, and so I just rushed up here to say--what I have said--and--and--please that's all, except----'

She gulped and choked, her small quivering and scarlet face with the pitiful eyes gazing down into his--and the years rolled away in the old man's sight, and his daughter was back at his side again. What was she saying in that pleading voice, as she knelt and clasped his shaking hand?

'Except--except--I'm sorry, I am! Oh--I didn't think how sad you were, and can't you love me just a bit?'

And what were Hepsie's feelings then when the old man rose, and seizing her in his arms, cried brokenly:

'Oh, child, if only your mother had said the same--only just once in the midst of my anger--but she passed her father by, she passed him by! And never a word in all these years of my loneliness and pain! My heart is breaking, for all its pride!'

'She wrote again and again,' declared Hepsie, and he started, and such a frown came then, that she was quite frightened, though she repeated, 'Indeed she did, and she loves you still.'

'Then,' said he, 'they never reached me! Some one has come between us. But never mind that now. I must go to your mother. Come,' he added, 'I must fetch my girl back to her home again, until her husband claims her from me.'
 

A Surprise

But when the two reached the little house in the lane a surprise awaited them. They found Mrs. Erldon in her husband's arms. He had returned unexpectedly, having, as a successful prospector for gold, done well enough to return home at once to fetch his wife and child.

No words could describe the joy in his wife's heart when her father took their hands and asked their forgiveness for years of estrangement, and told the tale of the intercepted letters, which he might never have discovered had it not been for little Hepsie's Christmas visit of peace and goodwill.

Hepsie is learning to control that little tongue of hers now, and she has, framed in her room, a verse that mother wrote for Hepsie especially:

Take heed of the words that hastily fly,          
Lest sorrow should weep for them by and by,          
And the lips that have spoken vainly yearn,          
Sighing for words that can never return!