MOLLIES TERROR BY NIGHT

New Zealand Tablet, Volume 31, Issue 44, 31 October 1907, Page 37

MOLLIES TERROR BY NIGHT

Carrie was coming to stay all night wiLh. Sue, and little Mollie was as happy as Sue herself.^ Carrie and Sue were bag girls. They wore long dresses and did fheir hair high ; but, to tell the truth, they were not quite used to their long dresses yet. To five-year-old Mollie, however, they were very old indeed — almost as old as grandma. She looked up at them with admiring eyes, and was happy if they spoke to her. Mollie slept in the little room next to Sue's. Sue's was a charming room, with but one drawback, the walls were so made that every- liWe sound in Sue'si room could tte heard in the other chambers. Mollie thought that this was the most delightful thing about it. 11 was only a little while since she hadbeen promoted to a room of her own. She was very proud to think of it in the daytime, hut at night it was v a dinerent story. She did not like to own that she was afraid, but she did feel as if she could not have stood it I! she had not been able to hear Sue's breathing all the time. Carrie and Sue had a great deal to say to each other, What girl friends ever failed to have, particularly in the middle of_the night ? When- Mollie went to sleep they were taiKing, and when she woke up they were still talking. Not that it was morning. Mollip dM not sleep well that night. Peihiaps she had eaten too much pastry. The clock was just striking eleven. It sounded very loud in the quiet of the night. When the strokes ceased it was altogether quiet except for the big girls' muffled voices. No, it was not quiet. What a lot of noises there were !' Could those be mice scamipea-irng behind the walls with that dreadful scratching ? Was it the frost -Khat made the roiof give that awful crack, or was it__a gun ? Carrie and Sue did not hear it. They were too much absorbed in their conversation. Their voices had unconsciously grown louder. Mollie could hear every word they said. Carrie was telling an interesting story when Sue's voice broke in. ' Hush ! ' she safd in that ghastly whisper tihiat carries farther than any spoken "word. 'We mustn't talk so loud. Remember the acoustics in this room.' The voices softened -and grew drowsy. Carrie and bue had talked themselves to sleep. But they had talked Mollie wide awake. She lay with eyes staring into the blackness, fairly shivering with terror. Acoustics ! What strange kind of an animal was this ? It sounded like a cow ! Mollie was desperately afraid of cows. But it could not be a cow because Sue's voice had sounded as if she were afraid oi it too, ancl Sue was not afraid of cows. It must be something sFill more dreadful. Mollie lay and shivered until her • trembling fairly shook the bed. She wanted to call mamma, but mamma had been sick v and Ehey were all very careful not to make any noise that would disturb her. A sudden shock might hurt her very much, me doctor fittt dld^ C S, U Sue > hul if> was in suc * a choky nttie voice and Sue was so sound asleep that she did not hear it. - . It seemed to her that she lay there for hours fnSS 5 m ° re * erriflea ev ery minute. Supp.ose, Oh suppose an acoustic, that dreadful creature, should be standing over her! MolUe could endure it no lonf™ C f? I cl , l «*od out of bed-softly, so that the acoustic should noli hear-and slipped down the ""stairs. But she was no sooner there than she wished herself back again. The dark and the terror were worse in the unfamiliar Hall than in her own room.

How she longed for her bed ! But she dared not go back, for acoustics were in the room. Sue had said so, and there was only a door between them. But there was also a door between her room and me hall. The acoustics might at any irinute come down the stairs. Crouching on the lowest step in the dark, in her fhin Iffctle nightdress, cold and terrified, Mollie was probably fhe most miserable child in the world at that minute. But somieone heard her ,so.b. Someone rose in.stantly from his warm bed and came out into the cold hall. So-meone picked Mollie up like a baby. Oh the comfort of running into that somebody's arms ! He carried her into the warm sitting-room and stirred the smouldering fire. He wrapped her in his own fur coat and the pretty" silk quilt that mamma kept downstairs and never gave to anybody hut company. He carried her to the couch, where she could see his bed through the open door, and tucked her up. He lit the soft night lamp and sat beside her till sue was fast asleep. To the day of her death Mollie will remember how/ the night of terror was turned into a night of uttermost comfort by flier father's touch. He thought she had had a dream. It vas not till the next day that Mollies frightened inquiries to Carrie and Sue brought the explanation. How her brothers and sisters laughed at her ! But her father did not laugh. In her time of mortification, as in her time of trouble, he was her stand-by. „ For a long time Mollie was much mortified at the occurrence, and often pondered over it, but as the years went by it became the dearest of her memories For tlhe,t I he , r f. ¥>* one th *ng that turns the most dreadful childish fears and the most heartbreaking of childish sorrows into a blessing forever ; and that is' the unspeakable preciousness of a father's- comforting? — Exchange. &