“But remember, you mustn’t tell father!” said Mrs Smith to her children.
“Mustn’t tell father!” whispered the older ones to the younger, holding up their fingers mysteriously and wisely.
“Mustn’t tell dad!” cried a girl of seven, joining the family chorus, to a baby of a year and a half, under whose weight she was staggering.
James Smith was foreman in a jeweller’s workshop. He was a skilled craftsman and a trustworthy man. His skill and faithfulness secured him the position he held, which was worth about three pounds a week. He therefore had a snug little house on the outskirts of the town, with a kitchen garden at the back and a flower garden in front. He had a beautiful, good‑natured young wife, and a large family.
His wife was pleasant and amiable, though without much firmness of character. She loved her children in a foolish and undiscriminating way, and to conceal their faults, she would often hide the truth from their father.
Strange to say, she was not always lenient with them herself. She was rather inconsistent in her treatment of them. She was so kind that she sometimes felt hurt when they did not respond in kind; and when she became angry, she would punish them sharply—though only for a moment, for the same child she struck one minute she was sure to hug, comfort, and soothe the next.
The father, on the other hand, was somewhat too stern, and too inclined to expect his family to behave with the regularity of a machine, making little allowance for the liveliness, thoughtlessness, and inexperience natural to children.
He loved Martha, but he was constantly giving her stern lectures, serious warnings, and long arguments on the subject of raising children according to his own ideas.
Truth be told, both the mother and her children were somewhat afraid of the father, and they were quieter and more guarded in their behaviour whenever the master of the house was at home.
This was not as it should have been. But the fault did not lie entirely with her.
He certainly had too rigid a manner; yet if his wife had been less timid—that is, if her confidence in honesty and good principle had encouraged her to meet her husband’s views with her own sound judgement, and thus temper them, instead of avoiding his rules and arguments through small deceptions—it would have been better for her, for him, and for the children.
James had some taste, and having saved a little money beyond what he regularly deposited in the savings bank each month, he replaced the small ornamental dogs and lambs with curly tails, and the painted lovers in crimson arbours that had once decorated his mantelpiece, with a handsome alabaster vase.
He had given his wife strict instructions not to allow the children to play ball or shuttlecock in the parlour.
Even in the days of the little glazed dogs with curly tails, there had been a standing rule against such games in that room, since they were likely to damage the china ornaments; but now that the alabaster vase stood alone on the mantelpiece in its elegance, the old rules had been deliberately repeated.
Poor Mrs Smith sat in the parlour surrounded by her numerous children, who were shouting, laughing, and pulling one another about—one laughing, another crying.
The mother sat in the midst of it all, with the baby peeping out at the scene from the shelter of her arm.
“Now John, you naughty boy, you know what your father says—no ball games in here! Ellen, I am astonished at you—put that ball down this instant. Goodness, children, you will drive me to distraction. But never mind, so long as your father does not hear of this tonight. You shall answer for it!”
Poor Mrs Smith—her conversation throughout the day ran continually in this manner. She believed herself worn out and tormented by her children, but she was quite mistaken.
She was in her natural element, and would probably have been miserable without these noisy little creatures constantly rushing about her.
“Now John, you naughty boy,” she began again, raising her voice above the din, when—crack!—John’s ball struck the vase and sent it crashing from the mantelpiece—the precious vase!
Alarm spread throughout the room. Even the smallest children were frightened by the looks on their elders’ faces and by their mother’s distress.
Her first impulse was to set the baby down, seize her son John, and thrash him soundly—all of which she promptly did.
John cried like a spoiled child, and before long the mother relented and said she would see what could be done, though he did not deserve it.
It was discovered that on its way from the mantelpiece to the hard floor, the vase had struck a cushioned chair and rolled from it to the ground without serious damage—except that it had broken cleanly into two pieces at its narrow and delicate waist.
A consultation was held.
An adhesive that James Smith had made for repairing broken china was brought out.
The broken edges fitted together admirably, the break being perfectly clean, with no fragments missing.
The adhesive was applied.
The result drew cheers from the children as the vase was restored to its place above the fireplace, and the words “mustn’t tell father” passed from one to another.
James Smith came home, and little suspected— that day, or the next, or for many days afterwards— that any such small deception had been practised upon him.
But one fine afternoon, Mrs Smith had gone upstairs to sort through her store of baby linen, while the children were playing in the back garden.
Having exhausted their amusements, they sat in a row against the garden wall, idle and ready for mischief.
An apple tree spread its branches before them along the fence, tempting them with its ripe fruit.
John stood up and walked past it once or twice, then ventured to point at a rosy apple with the stick he carried, glancing knowingly and mischievously at his brothers and sisters as he did so.
At this, the others exchanged glances with him and with one another, silently wishing for the apple while their expressions showed their awareness of the consequences of disobedience.
John tapped the apple, and they laughed. He passed again and struck it harder, and they laughed more loudly.
Richard jumped up—he must strike it too. Mary also had to give it a touch.
At last, John, emboldened by encouragement, struck the apple hard enough to bring it down.
Down it rolled, and its red and yellow sides made the eyes of the guilty children gleam as they shouted—a shout in which delight was mixed with guilty fear.
They gathered closely together. One bit into the apple, another eagerly snatched it for a taste, while the little one held up tiny hands and whimpered for a share.
They huddled together, and the mother, made suspicious by the unusual silence in the garden, leaned out of the window.
She caught them in plain conspiracy, and heard nothing but “don’t tell mother—don’t tell mother!” whispered from one to another.
It was only an apple, to be sure. But it came from the only apple tree in the garden.
The tree had been planted by the father on the birthday of his eldest son, John.
The fruit was to be gathered on Richard’s birthday, when the children were to receive a treat as a reward for not disturbing the apples that had hung so temptingly within their reach.
It was no wonder, considering all this, and considering that the tree was still young and unable to bear much fruit, that the apples had been counted and each one noted. Nor was it surprising, since they were of a fine variety, that James Smith wished to keep them untouched until they were fully ripe.
The children knew perfectly well how directly John had disobeyed his father’s orders.
Mrs Smith was deeply angry, I assure you, to think that her own children—whom she loved so dearly and treated so kindly—could behave towards her with such dishonesty.
She ran out of the house, snatching up in her haste a stick that had once formed the handle of a birch broom.
Armed with this, she chased after John, whose guilty conscience sent him running before her round and round the garden path.
At last she caught him and struck him on the back of one leg, whereupon John fell to the ground—for he was a foolish and helpless boy—and screamed.
It turned out that the end of the broomstick had a rusty nail protruding from it.
This pierced John’s leg just behind the ankle and left its point embedded in the flesh.
The matter proved serious. The doctor had to be sent for; and, of course, Mr Smith, the father, who might otherwise have known nothing of the incident, had to be informed of the entire affair.
“Don’t tell mother!” repeated Martha with feeling to her husband. “It broke my heart, James, to think that they could say it.”
“Had I heard them, Martha, instead of you,” said Smith, “would you not have expected me to be equally hurt by the words ‘don’t tell father’?”
“Certainly, James—if they would deceive one parent, they would deceive the other.”
“Precisely, Martha—and when you taught them to say ‘don’t tell father,’ you placed them on the path to deceiving yourself.”
“I taught them!” exclaimed Mrs Smith, blushing deeply.
“You did, my dear,” replied the husband. “When the vase was broken. Yes, Martha, that little matter has come to light. You taught the children to repair it and conceal the damage from their father; and in doing so, you not only gave them a lesson in deceiving yourself, but set them on a course which, if continued, might easily lead them in time to dishonesty, deceit, or worse.”
“Good gracious, James!” exclaimed the wife, blushing even more deeply, and now gathering the courage to defend herself. “What a grave and alarming way you have of speaking about such things! The truth is, James, that you are so severe in your judgements, and so stern with the children when they do wrong, that I cannot always bring myself to be completely open with you.”
Some further conversation followed, and the result was that James came to see there had been fault on his side as well—and he resolved to mend it.