The Argosy, Volume XXIV — page 12: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

8 Gabriel’s Appointment. Alice coloured and bowed, touched by the appeal: but wondering to what it would lead. “You were made aware, before you came, of my poor child’s in- firmity of mind, which makes her training and education a work of so much anxiety. We are allowed to hope that she will outgrow it, and meanwhile we oppose her fancies as little as possible, as direct opposition has a perilous effect on her nerves, She has a strange power of imagination, and lives, at times, in a world of her own—a world undreamed of by most children, for, singular as it may seem, and sad as it is to watch, her present dreams are all of one object— the acquisition of money.” ‘Ah !” said Alice, keenly. This agreed with her own impression, but she did not like to say so. “These jewels of mine,” continued Mrs. Salisbury, unlocking the box, “are to be hers after my death, as they would have been her mother’s, and the poor child has become so impressed with the idea of their value that a sight of them has latterly been her highe&t reward. Valuable they are—very valuable—and I mention It, to justify a precaution I wish to impress upon you. It may be trouble- some and inconvenient, but I think you will kindly forgive that, Miss Kerr.” ‘I will do anything you wish—I don’t mind what it is,” said Alice with perfect sincerity. “Then promise me never, on any consideration; to leave these jewels for a moment unguarded. If you are interrupted in your work, and wish to leave the room yourself, lock them up in the box, and take away the key. If you do it as a matter of course, you will have little difficulty ; but if you yield to Myra once on the subject, she will always grow excited when she has to give them up. You will keep my wishes in mind ?” She held out her hand to her young guest, who had only just time to return its pressure, when Myra, her hair and dress newly arranged for the occasion, came in to take her place. The face of the poor child, when established in her wicker chair, with an overturned basket at her feet, whose contents were to be supplied later, was so mournfully happy that it went to the heart of her painter. What a jangling of sweet bells must be going on to fill SO young a brain with such discordant notes! For it was, palpably, not the pleasure of looking at, or the desire of wearing, something beautiful and costly, reserved for state occasions and grown-up people—any girl younger than Myra might have thought that a treat. It was the keen look of the trader—and that of the lower, more sordid kind—which disfigured the childish countenance, and was, in itself, so unsuited to its shape and colouring that Alice was irresis- tibly reminded of the old Irish legend—in which the changeling elf, with its centuries of incomprehensible existence, appears in the form of the stolen babe. But she was not the less alive to the impetus comlicbooks.com