Chapter IV: Part II

"No, there's no use, boys, in your coming here this morning; there's no one to hold the class; so you'd better be off till the bells ring for service."

So spake old Ridger, the clerk, on the morning of the Sunday following, as he stood outside the closed door of the room in which Miss Lee was wont to meet her young pupils.

Some of the boys looked surprised, but Sam Wright, the gardener's son, observed, "I was a'most sure as there would be no class to-day, because Miss Lee is so ill."

"Ill!" echoed several voices.

"Ay, she's been ailing this long time," replied Sam. "Father says that she's never so much as taken a turn in the garden for months, and she used to have such pleasure in the flowers."

"But she has never missed her Sunday teaching once," said one of the boys.

"No, she'd come to that, if she were able to crawl," observed Sam; "that wasn't a pleasure, but a duty."

"It might have been a pleasure too, if it had not been for some chaps," said an elder boy, glancing at Seth.

"I thought that teacher looked very pale last Sunday," observed Eli Barnes, who had been one of her most attentive pupils; "but then she had been so worried. I noticed that she twice put her hand to her side."

"It was on Friday night that she was took so bad, so very bad," said Sam. "Father was just turning into bed, when there was a rap at our door; one of the servants had come over to tell him to go off in haste for the doctor. You may guess as father was not long in getting ready, for the servant said as Miss Lee seemed to be dying. The doctor came in an hour, as fast as his horse could gallop, though 'twas raining and blowing like mad. I couldn't get to sleep till I'd heard what he said of our teacher; neither could father, when he got home all wet to the skin; he must go up to the Hall for news of the lady."

"And what did the doctor say?" asked several voices at once.

Sam Wright looked very grave as he answered, "The doctor don't much expect that she'll get over the fever."

Some of the boys uttered exclamations of regret, others sighed and said nothing. All of them turned from the closed door, feeling sorry to think that their teacher might never enter it again.

In the meantime Miss Lee was lying in bed in a darkened room, while the spring sun was shining so brightly, as if to invite all to come out and enjoy his beams. The few persons who entered that room moved about as noiselessly as if they were shadows, for the poor patient was in a burning fever, and the sound of a step, or the rustle of a dress, would have been to her most distressing. No one spoke to Miss Lee, not even to ask her how she felt, for the fever had mounted into her brain, and the sufferer knew nothing of what was passing around her.

The teacher's mind was, however, still working, and even in delirium, she showed what had been the uppermost care on her mind. From the lips so parched and blackened by fever, words continually burst, though she who uttered them knew not what she was saying. The sick-nurse little guess why the patient grasped her own bed-clothes so tightly, and again and again cried out in a tone of distress, "I'll not let you go, little one; I'll not let you go!"

Most of the boys of the Sunday class strolled out on the uplands, to gather wild flowers, or to chat together, until it should be time for them to go into church. There was one little boy, however, who did not go with the rest, but preferred lingering alone amongst the graves in the churchyard. That boy was Seth Rogers, the naughtiest child in the Sunday class.

Old Ridger the clerk watched Seth, as the little fellow went slowly and laid himself down on the turf close to the grave of his mother. Ridger saw the child hide his face in his hands when he thought that he was out of the sight and hearing of all.

"That poor little motherless chap takes the lady's illness much to heart," said the good-natured clerk to himself. "I should not have expected it of Seth Rogers, for he has been—so my grandson tell me—the very plague of his teacher's life; and I myself have had to complain to the vicar a dozen times of his rude behaviour in church. Many a Sunday I've said, 'I'd like to give that young rogue a good thrashing, for there's nothing else as will bring him into order.' But the child seems quiet and sad enough now," added Ridger, and taking up his cane, the old clerk walked slowly up to the spot where Seth Rogers was lying on the turf, and as he did so, he heard from the boy something that sounded much like a sob.

"Come, child, you mustn't take on so," said the clerk, stooping over Seth, and gently touching his shoulder. "Miss Lee may recover, and get about again, if it be the Lord's will; and if not—"

Seth raised himself from the ground; the little fellow's cheeks were wet, and his eyes were glistening with tears.

"O Mr. Ridger, do you think she will die?" he asked in an agitated tone.

"We should all be very sorry were Miss Lee to die," was the old man's rather evasive answer.

"No one would be so sorry as I," cried the child, bursting into tears, "because—because—" Seth could not finish the sentence, his heart was too full for words.

Old Ridger seated himself on a bench, and drew the little boy close to his breast, for the clerk was a kindly man, and always felt for a child in trouble. He gently stroked Seth's shoulder, as he said, "I never thought that you loved your teacher so much more than do the rest of the boys."

"It's not that I loved her more, but that I worried her more," murmured the child, in a scarcely audible tone. "They did not plague her, and make her so tired, and bring the tears into her eyes. They did not tell her untruths." The boy was speaking rather to himself than to the clerk; Seth was thinking aloud in the spirit of those touching lines on the death of a mother,—

"And now I recollect with pain
How many times I grieved her sore;
Oh, if she would but come again,
I think I would do so no more!"

The old clerk rose from his seat, for the church-bells were sounding, and it was time for him to go and look out the psalms and the lessons for the day. Ridger had but one word of comfort to give the poor little boy before he left him alone.

"You know that you can pray for the lady," said he.

But could Seth Rogers pray? He never had prayed in his life, no, not even when he had been kneeling close to Miss Lee, while she besought the Lord to bless her and her little pupils. Seth had, alas! been too apt even then to stare around, perhaps trying to make others as careless and inattentive as he was himself. Seth had never once really joined in the prayer of his teacher, he had only been restless and impatient to have the praying-time over.

But when old Ridger had gone away, and the child was left for some minutes alone in the churchyard, then, for the first time, Seth Rogers really did pray. He threw himself again on the ground on which lay the shadow from the grave of his mother, and sobbed forth, "Oh, please—please don't let teacher die, until I've seen her again, and tried to make up for the past."