Daybreak: A Story for Girls

								

Kate's eyes softened as she said this,--she had beautiful eyes, large
and dark.  The rest of her face was plain: it showed much strength of
purpose, but little feeling.  Poor Kate! the furrows on her forehead,
the old, sad smile, so unlike a child's, and the bony hands, told of
much hard work, much care, and deep and painful anxieties in the past.
She was sitting on the window ledge, half supporting little Frances in
her arms.  It was no new attitude to Kate.  Her figure was stunted and
slightly bent from the efforts she had made years ago to carry her
little sister about; but the weight of little Frances had rested upon
her in another way also, and it was perhaps owing to her brave efforts
to shield the child from evil and from grief that the contrast in
appearance was so marked between the two sisters.  Frances with her
soft little pink and white face, her solemn eyes, and smiling mouth,
and without a hard line anywhere, looked as if life had smiled upon her.
All through the day the little strangers kept close together, and took
very little notice of what went on around them.  They ate their
Christmas dinner in solemn silence, and declined to join in the games.
Mother Agnes was disappointed, for her whole heart was bound up in her
children's happiness; and least of all she could bear to see sad faces
on Christmas Day.  She watched Kate with much interest, but could not
wholly understand her.



      *      *      *      *      *      *
Before many months had passed, a curious transformation came over Kate.
She became the recognised leader of the children.  Mother Agnes saw
with despair Jane's influence waning before that of this strange new
girl.  Jane was so safe, so true, so dependable; and Kate, well, who
could trust Kate, with her odd ways of going on?  Sometimes she would
keep the younger ones awake half the night telling them the wildest of
tales.  She had laws of her own for the play-hours, and a secret system
of rewards and punishments.  But, worst of all, she was not
straightforward.  Mother Agnes, with her true, honest nature, was cut
to the heart to find that Kate could act a part, and did not scruple to
do so, to shield herself and her little sister from punishment.
Kate was popular now, and yet no one loved her, and she loved no one
except little Frances.  She never thought any trouble too great to be
taken for her little sister.  If any one said a rough word to Frances,
Kate contrived to punish the offender in a way that was not easily
forgotten.  She helped Frances with her lessons; shielded her from
blame; dressed dolls for her through whole long summer afternoons; told
her stories that aimed vaguely at having a good moral; answered her
childish questions with infinite patience.
The summer and autumn passed, and Christmas came and went; and after
Christmas an event happened, the memory of which no lapse of years
could ever efface from poor Kate's mind.  A certain morning dawned,