The Happy Visitor

 

Jessie remembers differently

  When I go in there the room smells funny, and hot, and I tell myself that this time I am going to be a good sister, and take his poor thin hand, and stroke his hot face, but then he says something hateful and I can’t hold it back, I want to squeeze his miserable little cheeks until they have crumbled to nothing.

I want to be good like the little children in books, Little Nell and Tiny Tim or Sara Crewe, giving her only bread to the starving child. But I am a disagreeable child and when Mother sends me to our room I pinch my own fat cheeks and cry.

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Finally the triumphant day came when he could cast aside his crutches and walk again. “Will you go home now?” the father asked. “I don’t think so, if it’s quite all right with you,” answered the boy. “I think I shall stay here and join this wonderful family.” And there was such a rejoicing of tears and kisses as had never been seen in all the town of Malvern before or since.

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