Part 18 (1/2)
”That Walter has got into some sc.r.a.pe.”
”Why should he not write himself if it were so?”
”He is too much ashamed, and gets his friend to do it for him. I know the ways of young men!”
”Perhaps he is ill!” said Molly.
”Perhaps. It is long since I saw a letter from him! I am never allowed to read or hear one!”
”Can you wonder at that, when you are always abusing him? If he were my son, I should take care you never saw a sc.r.a.p of his writing! It makes me wild to hear those I love talked of as you talk of him--always with a sniff!”
”Love, indeed! Do you suppose no one loves him but you?”
”His father loves him dearly!”
”How dare you hint that I do not love him!”
”If yours is love, auntie, I wish I may never meet it where I've no chance of defending myself!”
Molly had a hot temper where her friends were concerned, though she would bear a good deal without retorting.
”There!” said Aunt Ann, giving her the letter; ”put that on the mantel-piece till he comes.”
Molly took it, and gazed wistfully at it, as if fain to read it through the envelope. She had had that morning a strange and painful dream about Walter--that he lay in his coffin, with a white cat across his face.
”What if he _should_ be ill, auntie?” she said.
”Who ill?”
”Walter, of course!”
”What then? We must wait to know!”
”Father wouldn't mind if we just opened it to make sure it was not about Walter!”
”Open my brother's letter! Goodness gracious, what next! Well, you _are_ a girl! I should just like to see him after you had opened one of his letters!”
Miss Hanc.o.c.k had herself once done so--out of pure curiosity, though on another pretense--a letter, as it happened, which he would rather not have read himself than have had her read, for it contained thanks for a favor secretly done; and he was more angry than any one had ever seen him. Molly remembered the occurrence, though she had been too young to have it explained to her; but Molly's idea of a father, and of Richard Colman as that father, was much grander than that of most children concerning fathers. There is indeed a much closer relation between some good men and any good child than there is between far the greater number of parents and their children.
She put the letter on the chimney-piece, and went to the dairy; but it was to think about the letter. Her mind kept hovering about it where it stood on the chimney-piece, leaning against the vase with the bunch of silvery honesty in it. What if Walter was ill! Her father would not be home till the last train, and there would be none to town before the slow train in the morning! He might be very ill!--and longing for some one to come to him--his father of course--longing all day long! Her father was reasonable as he was loving: she was sure he would never be angry without reason! He was a man with whom one who loved him, and was not presuming, might take any honest liberty! He could hardly be a good man with whom one must never take a liberty! A good man was not the man to stand on his dignity! To treat him as if he were, was to treat him as those who can not trust in G.o.d behave to Him! They call Him the Supreme Euler! the Almighty! the Disposer of events! the Judge of the whole earth!--and would not ”presume” to say ”Father, help thy little child!”
She would not wrong her father by not trusting him! she would open the letter! she would not read one word more than was needful to know whether it came to say that Walter was ill! Why should Mr. Sullivan have put his name outside, except to make sure of its being attended to immediately!
She went hack to the room where lay the letter. Her aunt was there still. Molly was glad of it: the easiest way of letting her know, for she would not have done it without, was to let her see her do what she did! She went straight to the chimney, reached up, and took the letter.
”Leave that alone!” cried Miss Hanc.o.c.k. ”I know what you are after! You want to give it to my brother, and be the first to know what is in it!
Put it back this moment!”
Molly stood with the letter in her hand.