TEDDY’S LOST OPPORTUNITY.
By Luella Watson Kinder
“TEDDY,” and grandma’s tremulous voice was wafted into the lower hall, where Teddy was hurriedly strapping his school-books preparatory to rushing off to school. An ugly frown appeared on his face, and he answered not a word. “Teddy, my boy,” and this time she leaned over the balustrade just above his head. Teddy knew now that his grandmother saw him, so it was useless to pretend he did not hear. “Ma’-am?” he shouted, very crossly and much louder than there was any necessity for. He would like to have said, “What?” but he knew that that would be going a step too far, for his father had taught him he must speak respectfully to his elders and not say, “What?” “Yes,” and “No,” as some children do. “Won’t you please stop at Mrs. Bennett’s and leave this package for me? It is early, and you go past their house, don’t you?” she asked timidly, noticing the frown. “Yes’m, sometimes I go that way. I’m in an awful big hurry to get there this morning. Our football team has to practise before school, an’ I just can’t stop, gran’ma,” and he shouldered his books. “Here, ’tis all ready wrapped up, so I won’t keep you a moment waitin’ on me,” and the frail little form began hurriedly descending the steps, hoping the boy would change his mind. He evidently would have done so had not his mother bustled into the hall just then. Mrs. Vane was an energetic woman, and the full, round tones of her voice showed strength of will. “What is it now, ma?” she interrogated somewhat sharply. “Nothin’, only I just thought maybe Teddy could leave this package at Mrs. Bennett’s for me.”10 The old lady hesitated, with a half-frightened, appealing glance at the child, but he opened the door and passed out. “O, Teddy hasn’t time to be bothered with your little traps, ma! If Mrs. Bennett is in a hurry for the things, she can send for them.” “But I promised I’d send them, and she’ll think”— “I can’t help what she thinks. I s’pose she’ll get her things sometime. I wish you would not borrow things, mother, if they have to be returned at a certain moment of a certain day.” And Mrs. Vane seized the dusting-brush and hurried into the sitting-room, from which her voice rang in— “Let us scatter seeds of kindness,
For our reaping by and by.” Upstairs, grandma, alone in her room, wiped away a few tears, and opened her Bible to where “even Christ pleased not Himself,” and meditated on it until she almost convinced herself “that Mary was right in speakin’ so. I know I’m an old bother and ought not to expect to have things done to please me.” Then she crept into “Mary’s” room and got the piled-up darning basket, which she carried back and seated herself to darn. As Teddy carried his lunch he did not return to dinner, and several times through the day a sweet, wrinkled face, surmounted by thin gray hair, brushed smoothly back under a black lace cap, would come between him and the page of his book. He saw again a pitiful, appealing glance and noted the shrinking of a tiny, withered form under his sharply-spoken mother’s words. “Poor little grandma!” he thought. “I might just as well have taken the package for her. It would not have taken a moment, an’ she knits my mittens an’ mends my clothes. Never mind, I’ll take it just as soon as I get home.” Ah, Teddy, good resolutions sometimes come too late! When he reached home and was bounding up the front steps, his sister opened the door. Her eyes were red with weeping, and she motioned him to be quiet. “It’s dear grandma,” she said. “She has had a stroke of paralysis. When I went to call her to dinner she was sitting by the window with one of your stockings on her hand. She had been darning it, but could not move when I got to her.” “But,” gasped the boy, “she—she isn’t dead is she?” “Yes, she died a few moments ago. Didn’t the messenger boy meet you?” Teddy never forgot the bitter anguish of that moment. Years after he became a man, the sight of a certain half-darned stocking brought tears to his eyes and pained his heart. As he sat in the darkened room near all that was left of his gentle little grandmother, and listened to his mother and others tell the many virtues of the departed loved one, the uppermost thought in his mind was, “Why, if they loved her so, did they not speak to her more tenderly, and why did they so often refer to her as ‘childish’ or ‘old and cranky’?” Why, indeed? Ah, children, and those who may read this incident, be kind and considerate to the aged! They may seem queer in their ways and have odd notions. Their ideas are probably behind the times, their prejudices strong, and they may like to lecture you a little. Take it pleasantly. Humor their little ways and notions, and speak kindly to them. Tell them little items of interest. They will not be with you long, and if you could realize how lonely they feel sometimes, as they think of all the friends and loved ones gone on before, you would try to throw more brightness into the clouds which surround the setting of life’s sun, and make them feel that there is still one who loves them, this side “Jordan’s stormy banks.”