Joanna Mathews - Nellie's Housekeeping. Little Sunbeams Series

"For I do see I'm growing cross and hateful," she said to herself. "I can't bear to have the children come and ask me to play, or to do any little favor for them, and I don't like it very much whenever mamma wants me to help her. I know I felt provoked when she asked me to roll the baby's wagon this morning, though I don't think I let her see it. I believe I don't feel so happy or so good, or even so well, as I used to do, and I don't know – I'm afraid it is so much reading and studying makes it so. I think I'll have to make up my mind not to know as much, or to be so quick and clever as Maggie, and Gracie, and some of the others."

But this was a hard resolve for Nellie, and she fell to sleep in no happy frame of mind.

She slept later than usual the next morning, for her mother, remembering how dull and languid she had seemed, would not let her be awakened; and Mrs. Ransom and the children were just finishing breakfast when she came downstairs.

"Why, where's papa?" asked Nellie, seeing his place was vacant.

"A telegram came this morning which called him to town very unexpectedly," said her mother. "He went in and kissed you as you lay asleep, and left his love and good-by for you, and told me to tell you he hoped to see his own old Nellie back when he comes home in a week's time."

Nellie knew what that meant, but she was sorry that papa had gone, – sorry, not only that he should have been obliged to leave home sooner than he had expected, but also that she could not now talk more with him on the matter of her studies.

However, there was her dear mother: she would listen to her, and give her all the advice and help she needed.

The children asked permission to leave the table, which was granted; but Mrs. Ransom herself sat still while Nellie took her breakfast, talking cheerily to her, and trying to tempt her very indifferent appetite by offering a little bit of this or that.

"Nellie," said her mother, when they were alone, "I was thinking of asking you how you would like to be my little housekeeper."

"Your housekeeper, mamma!" echoed Nellie, pausing in the act of buttering her biscuit, and looking at her mother with surprise.

"Yes," answered Mrs. Ransom, "or rather suppose we should be housekeeper together, you being feet and hands, and I being the head. Is that a fair division, think you?"

Nellie colored and laughed.

"Why, yes; but do you think I could, mamma?"

"I think there are a hundred little things you might do if you would like," said her mother. "I'll give you the keys, and you may make the store-room and sideboard your especial charge, keeping them in perfect order, giving out what is needed, seeing that the sugar-bowls, tea-caddy, cracker-basket, and so forth, are kept full, taking my orders to the cook, and other little things which will be a great help to me, and which will give you some useful lessons. What do you say?"

"Why, I'd like it ever so much, mamma, but" —

"Well, but what?" said Mrs. Ransom, as Nellie hesitated.

"Mamma, I think I'm rather stupid about such things, and I might make you trouble sometimes."

"Not stupid , Nellie; and, if you are willing to learn, I shall be willing to put up with a little trouble now and then, and to excuse mistakes. If you undertake it, I believe you will be faithful and painstaking, as you are about every thing, and that you can really be a great help to me. Will you try it for a week, and see how you like it? By the time that papa comes home again, you will be accustomed to it, and he will not be apt to suffer from the little slips you may make at first."

"Yes, indeed, mamma; and, if you are not tired of such a funny housekeeper as I shall make, I don't think I shall be tired of doing it. Mamma, do you think I could learn to make some cake? those ginger-snaps papa likes?"

"I do not doubt it," said Mrs. Ransom, smiling back into the face that was eager and bright enough now.

"Mamma," said Nellie, "did papa tell you what we were talking about last evening while we were out walking?"

"Yes, dear, he did; and he said he thought our Nellie had sense enough to see what she ought to do, and courage and strength of mind enough to make any sacrifice she felt to be right."

"Courage, mamma?"

"Yes, dear, it often needs much courage – what is called moral courage – to resolve to do what we feel to be a duty, especially if it calls for any sacrifice of our pride or vanity, or of the desire to appear well in the eyes of others."

Nellie knew that she was thinking of such a sacrifice, and it was rather a consolation to have mamma speaking of it in this way.

"Moral courage" sounded very fine.

But she sat silent, slowly eating her omelet and biscuit, and feeling that she had not quite made up her mind how far the sacrifice must go, or how much of her work she should decide to give up. But one thing she had fully resolved, – that her studies should no longer interfere with what papa called "nearer and plainer duties," or cause needless injury to her health and temper. She would help mamma, play with the children, walk and run as other little girls of her age did, and try hard to put from her all rebellious and impatient feelings at not being quite so clever as some among her schoolmates.

"Mamma," she said, after another pause, during which she had finished her breakfast, – "mamma, how much do you think it would be wise for me to study every day?"

"Well," said Mrs. Ransom slowly, and as if she knew that she was about to give advice that would not be quite agreeable, "if you wish to know what I think wisest , I should say give up study altogether for at least a fortnight."

"For a whole fortnight, two weeks, mamma?" echoed Nellie, in dismay. She had expected that her mother would say she might well study two hours a day, hoped for three, wished that it might be four, and had resolved to be content with the allowance proposed; but to give up her books altogether for two weeks! "It seems such a waste of time for such a great girl as me, mamma," she added.

"Well, my great girl of ten years, suppose we say one week then," said Mrs. Ransom playfully. "Keep on with your practising as usual, and with your half-hour of sewing these with your new housekeeping duties will take up a good part of the morning without much 'waste of time,' I think; the rest of the day I would give entirely to play and amusement. If at the end of a week we do not find that you are feeling better and happier" —

"And not so cross," put in Nellie, with rather a shamefaced smile.

Her mother smiled, too, and took up her speech. "Then we will agree that my plan was not needful, and that all this constant poring over books does not hurt your health, your temper, or your mind."

"Yes, mamma," said Nellie, with a sigh she could not suppress, though she did try to speak cheerfully. Then she added, "O mamma, I should so like to be a very clever, bright girl, and to know a great deal!"

"A very good thing, Nellie, but not the first of all things, my daughter," said Mrs. Ransom, putting her arm about the waist of her little girl, who had risen and come over to her side.

"No, mamma," said Nellie softly, "and you think I have made it the first of all things lately, do you not?"

Before Mrs. Ransom could answer, sounds of woe came from the piazza without, Daisy's voice raised in trouble once more.

Tears and smiles both lay near the surface with Daisy, and had their way by turns. One moment she would be in the depth of despair, the next dimpling all over with laughter and frolic; so that Nellie did not fear any very serious disaster when she ran to see what the matter was.

The great misery of Daisy's life was this, – that people were always taking her for a boy, a mistake which she considered both unnatural and insulting, and which she always resented with all her little might.