Jane Helen Findlater > Story of a mother

i4 THE STORY OF A MOTHER
very wet, and the whole livelong day he
might be boxed up in church. And then was
there not Monday too to be lived through ?
Alas, poor Zack, you had not learned patience
then, for five days seemed to you like five
years in prospect!
Lost in these bitter thoughts, Zack sat
kicking his heels the whole evening ; it was on
the way upstairs to bed that the fire, long
smouldering, broke out.
‘ I hate ministers; I hate services; I don’t
know how I’m going to live until Tuesday,’
cried Zack on the top step of the garret stair.
‘ Oh . . ., oh . . .,’ went the little girls, and
then Mary in her baldest manner spoke words
of wisdom.
‘You ’re going to be made a minister your¬
self, Zack; I heard father say so to Dr. Grant
to-night, so you needn’t speak that way.’
‘ Made into one! I ’ll make my own life; I
won’t have any other person—no, not my
father or any one—make my life for me. I ’ll
live how I like, and where and how—you talk
as if I were my father’s slave ! ’