"I never make fun of anybody," said Paula reproachfully.
"No, Mademoiselle, I ought to know that better than anybody else! Well,
perhaps it might be well to tell you. If you must know it, it's this. There
are many, I find, that wish they could be in my place tonight"
"In your place tonight! I'm afraid I don't understand," said Paula.
"Well, you see, I've got four or five of my old comrades who also want to
learn to read."
"What's that you say?" Teresa said, leaving her knitting to stand in front
of the Breton.
"It's true enough, Mademoiselle Teresa, and when you come to think of it,
it's not a bit strange. Down at the factory they all know how different and
how happy I am. And how they _did_ make fun of me when I started to learn
to read; just as they jeered at me when Jesus Christ first saved me and I
learned to pray. But now some of them, seeing how happy I am, also want to
learn to read, and who knows but some day they will want to know how to
pray to the Lord Jesus also."
Paula's face took on a serious expression--finally, however, she slowly
shook her head.
"You know, with all my heart, I'd just love to see it done; but it's
perfectly useless, I suppose, even to think of it," she said sadly.
"That's what I thought too," said the Breton; "I'm sorry I spoke about it"
"Well, I don't know," continued Paula. "Perhaps if uncle could arrange
somehow--I remember when I was quite small, back there before I left the
valley, my dear god-mother had a night-school for laboring men. It was just
lovely. They learned to read and to write and to calculate. Then
afterwards, each night before they went home they would sing hymns and read
the Bible and pray."
"Yes, that's all very well," said Teresa, "but your godmother was a whole
lot older than you are."
Then turning to the Breton she said, "Why don't you tell your friends to go
to the night-school in town?"
"Well," said the Breton, "I know that they learn 'many things there, but
they don't teach them about God. However, as I said before, I'm sorry I
mentioned the thing. Let's not speak any more about it"
"Well," said Paula, "I know what I'm going to do. I'll speak to the Lord
Jesus about it."
And Paula kept her promise.
One morning, Teresa usually not at all inquisitive, could not seem to keep
her eyes off a certain little group who were engaged in moving out of one
of the "Red Cottages" across the road. More than once she paused in her
work of tidying up the house to peer out of one window or another.
"That's the very best of all the 'Red Cottages,' and they're moving out of
it" remarked Teresa finally.
"Of what importance is that?" I said to her rather sharply. I was washing
windows, and that task always made me irritable.
"I've got a certain idea!" Teresa said.
"Tell me your big idea," I said.
"No! You go ahead and wash your windows. I'll tell you tomorrow."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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