"Mother!" she cried, and then waited.

Mrs. Procter looked up from her kneading.

"What is it, Maizie?" she asked.

"Didn't Jesus ever laugh?" asked Maizie.

No one spoke. Maizie, engaged in peeling a large potato, went on quite unconscious of the variant expressions pictured in the faces of her audience: "He's always so sad in our Sunday School lessons, mother. Even when He said, 'Suffer little children to come unto me,' He didn't smile--or they never say so when they read the chapter," she finished.

Mrs. Procter looked helplessly at Suzanna. And Suzanna rose to the occasion. "Maizie," she said, "you know Jesus was born in a manger so His mother didn't have much money and it was hard to make both ends meet. And, besides, there wasn't anything to smile about in those days when the world was so fresh."

"I guess that's right," Mrs. Procter agreed. "What with going round and trying to persuade people to be good and understand what He was trying to tell them, there couldn't have been much excuse for smiling."

Maizie, however, was tenacious. "Mother, you know at times even when things have all gone wrong you've laughed at something the baby did,"

she said looking up from her work.

"Yes, I know," put in Suzanna, as though Maizie had spoken to her. "But mother doesn't have to go round turning water into wine and doing lots of other wonderful things."

"Well, I wish He had smiled," Maizie persisted.

Suzanna looked searchingly at her sister. "Why do you wish that, Maizie?" she asked.

"Oh, I'd think then He was more like a big brother," said Maizie. "Now, sometimes I kind of feel afraid of Him."

"If you didn't feel afraid of Him, Maizie," Suzanna asked, turning back to the cold stove and vigorously polishing away, "do you think you'd be a better girl?"

Maizie flushed resentfully. "I'm good enough now," she answered.

"But you get mad for nothing, Maizie," said Suzanna; "you always get mad when you don't see things."

"Anybody would get mad," Maizie exclaimed. "Why just yesterday when we were playing in the yard you said, 'Behold, the lion marcheth down the yard. Maizie, quick, quick, out of the way,' and when I said, 'I don't see any lion, Suzanna,' you said, 'Well, he's there, right beside you.

Don't you hear him roaring?' and there wasn't any lion there at all."

"Well, Maizie, you can't see anything unless it's there," deplored Suzanna.

"You mean, Suzanna," put in Mrs. Procter as she covered the dough with a snowy cloth, "that you have more imagination than Maizie."

"Well, anyway, Maizie," said Suzanna after a time, "I'm going to try and make you a better girl."

"Make her stop saying that, mother," said Maizie, "I'm good enough as it is."

Suzanna said nothing more then. She finished her stove, and then, when Maizie had peeled all the potatoes, Suzanna went into the parlor and dusted all the furniture very carefully. Maizie followed and stood watching her sister.

"How could you make me better, Suzanna?" she asked, after a time, curiosity elbowing pride aside.

"I meant to tell you a story," said Suzanna; "about something you've never heard before." She went on dusting.

"Would the story make me a better girl?"

"Yes, and happier, too."

"Is it a nice story, Suzanna?"

"Awfully sweet."

"When could you tell me, Suzanna?"

"We'll go out into the yard after I've finished dusting and then I'll tell you the story, Maizie."

"All right."

So when the dusting was accomplished, the children sought the back yard. Suzanna procured a soap box, placed it beneath the one tree, while Maizie drew another very close to her sister that she might lose no word, and settled with keen antic.i.p.ation to listen to Suzanna's story.

The day was hot, with scarcely a breeze stirring. Still, with the quiet there was a freshness in the air that made the children draw in deep breaths.

Suzanna began very softly: "Maizie, do you see that big rose nodding near the fence over there at Mrs. Reynolds'?"

Yes, Maizie saw the rose.

"Well, yesterday when you were wheeling the baby and I was sitting on this very box putting b.u.t.tons on Peter's waist, that rose all at once walked across the road to me! It stood by my side for a long time, and then it said softly, 'Suzanna,' and it looked at me and it was all pink and very sweet, and it said to me, 'Suzanna, how old are you?' and I said, 'I'm nearly eight, Lady Rose, and Maizie is nearly seven. Mother had hardly got over my coming to her when Maizie came along.'

"And the rose said, 'Maizie? Is that the little girl that is going to ask tomorrow whether Jesus ever smiled?' And I said, 'Yes, Maizie will be peeling a big potato, and I'll be polishing the stove, and mother will be kneading bread when Maizie will ask that question.'

"'Well,' said the rose, 'you must tell her that once upon a time Jesus _did_ smile, but they didn't put it in the Bible because it didn't seem 'portant to grown folks, and they didn't think that all the little children in the world would sometimes wish He had smiled.' And then the rose went on to tell me the story of the dear smile."

Maizie gazed wide-eyed at her sister. "Did you really see the rose with your eyes, Suzanna?"

"Yes," Suzanna answered; "truly with my eyes." She suddenly sat up very straight and pointed a small finger, "and there it's coming again. It's nodding its head at me. Look, Maizie!"

Maizie jumped.

"There, see, Maizie, it's walking right through Mrs. Reynolds' gate.

Isn't it graceful?"

"How can it walk on one stem?" asked Maizie, the literalist.

"Well, it does, doesn't it? You can see it. Now, it's coming into our yard." Suzanna waited, then: "Good morning, Lady Rose," she greeted in a high treble voice. "Come and stand near Maizie." Maizie moved quickly to make room. "You see it now, don't you, Maizie?" Maizie hesitated. She stared hard at the spot near her, then up with wistful eyes into Suzanna's face.

"I can't see it, Suzanna," she said at length. "Do you think mother'd better take me to the doctor and have my eyes examined like Mrs.

Reynolds had hers?"

Suzanna felt flowing over her a sudden wave of pity. "No, Maizie, dear,"

she said, putting her arms about Maizie and drawing her close. "Maybe I see the rose with something inside of me. But never mind, lamb girl--isn't that pretty, Mrs. Reynolds calls me that--the rose has gone home again. Listen close and I'll tell you the story that was left out of the Bible, just as the rose told it to me."

Maizie settled herself again, expectantly.

"This will be told, Maizie, in the way the Bible is written. Funny words that we don't know the meaning of, but can guess; terrible threats."

"Oh, don't," cried Maizie, "don't, I don't want 'terrible threats.' It sounds awful."