A few tears trickled down Abby’s cheeks.  Larry blinked hard and stared at the wall.

“My dear children, that is not the way to honor our Blessed Mother,” Mrs. Clayton went on to say.  “Do you think that she looked down with favor upon your work to-day?  No.  But if you had waited as I told you,—­if each of you had made a little altar for her in your heart and offered to her the beautiful flowers of patience, and the votive lights of loving obedience,—­then indeed you would have won her blessing, and she would have most graciously accepted the homage of such a shrine.  As it is, you see, you have very little, if anything, to offer her.”

III.

For two or three days Mrs. Clayton suffered the oratory to remain as the children had arranged it.  They said their prayers there morning and evening; and to Abby especially the ridges and patches in the carpet, which now seemed to stare her out of countenance, the pink vases, and the candelabra, were a constant reproach for her disobedience.  Larry, too, grew to hate the sight of them.  He often realized poignantly also that it is not well to be too easily influenced by one’s playmates; for if he happened to be late and ran into the room and popped down on his knees in a hurry, he was almost sure to start up again with an exclamation caused by the prick of one of the numerous tacks which he had inadvertently left scattered over the floor.

When the good mother thought that the admonition which she wished to convey was sufficiently impressed, she had the carpet taken up, repaired as much as possible, and properly laid.  Then she hung soft lace curtains at the window, draped the altar anew, took away the pink vases, and put the finishing touches to the oratory.  It was now a lovely little retreat.  Abby and Larry never tired of admiring it.  They went in and, out of the room many times during the day; and the image of the Blessed Virgin, ever there to greet them, by its very presence taught them sweet lessons of virtue.  For who can look upon a statue of Our Lady without being reminded of her motherly tenderness, her purity and love; without finding, at least for a moment, his thoughts borne upward, as the angels bore the body of the dead St. Catherine, from amid the tumult of the world to the holy heights, the very atmosphere of which is prayer and peace?

Whenever Abby felt cross or disagreeable, she hid herself in the oratory until her ill-humor had passed.  This was certainly a great improvement upon her former habit, under such circumstances, of provoking a quarrel with Larry, teasing Delia, and taxing her mother’s patience to the utmost.  She liked to go there, too, in the afternoon when she came in from play, when twilight crept on and deepened, and the flame of the little altar lamp that her father had given her shone like a tiny star amid the dusk of the quiet room.  Larry liked it better when, just after supper, the candles of the candelabra were all lighted, and the family gathered around the shrine and said the Rosary together.