When she went up stairs to get the handkerchief out of her drawer she
saw her bureau was yet in disorder. "Mamma will be displeased to see
this," she thought, "and I shall have time enough to put it in order and
hem papa's handkerchief beside." She went eagerly to work, but the
bureau took her longer than she anticipated, and when her father came
home to dinner she had not finished his handkerchief.
Now she made her needle fly, but her industry came too late; her father
could not wait, and Emily had the mortification of hearing him say:
"I hope my handkerchief will not be like my gloves, that you kept so
long to mend, and mamma had to finish after all."
She cried bitterly after he was gone, but managed through her tears to
finish the handkerchief at last, and carried it to her mother, asking
her to beg her papa's forgiveness.
After tea was over, Mrs. Manvers called Emily to her, and folding her
arm fondly around the little girl's waist, pointed to a small book lying
open upon the table, saying as she did so:
"Do you remember, my love, our conversation last Saturday night upon the
subject of your gifts?"
"Oh, yes, mamma, and you told me you would keep an account of my
ill-usage of one of them."
"I have done so, my dear, and now tell me can you not imagine what this
gift is which you so much abuse?"
"Indeed, I cannot, mamma," replied the little girl with a sigh.
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