Part 28 (1/2)
”It's the strangest thing--the strangest thing--oh, I'm going to tell you all about it, and see if you can help me out. Is there any place that we can be quite alone? I want to read this letter to you.”
”There isn't a soul in the waiting-room,” said Lancelot, ”we can go in there. You'd better run on without me, Tommy,” he called, ”the doctor wants me. You can catch up with the girls if you hurry,” and Tommy, who had eyed the pair with curiosity, departed crestfallen.
”I received this letter this morning,” explained Dr. Grennell, as they sat down in the stuffy little room. ”Read it. It's from an old friend of mine in Newfoundland--a physician.”
The letter opened with personal matters, but the paragraph that the minister pointed out to Lancelot read thus:
”We have had a rather unusual case here lately. You know how often we have men brought to the hospital who have been s.h.i.+pwrecked, and as a rule there is little that is interesting about them--most of them are the type of ordinary seamen. Our latest case, however, was entered by the captain of a sailing vessel, who reported that they had picked the man up from a raft. That he was delirious then, and had never been able to tell them who he was or whence he came. He is still very ill and unconscious, and there is not a paper about him of identification.
He is a gentlemen--I am sure of that, for his broken sentences are uttered in perfect English, and his hands tell it, too. As I have said, there isn't a letter or a paper about him, but around his neck on a silver chain we found the coin which I enclose. I know your fancy for odd coins, and so I send it, thinking perhaps you may give us some clue to our patient's ident.i.ty.”
Launcelot's eyes were bright with excitement as he finished reading.
”Let me see the coin,” he begged, eagerly, and as the doctor handed it to him, he jumped to his feet.
”I thought so,” he shouted, ”it's a Spanish coin, like Judy's.”
”Well,” said the minister, quietly, but his hand beating against his knee showed that his agitation matched Launcelot's--”What then?”
”Why, the man must be Judy's father!” said Launcelot, and when he had thus voiced the doctor's thought, the two stared at each other with white faces.
”She always believed he was alive,” said Launcelot at last.
”Pray G.o.d that it is really he?” said Dr. Grennell, reverently.
”And now what can we do?” asked the boy.
”We must not say a word to Judy yet. In fact I don't know whether we ought to tell the Judge. We musn't raise false hopes.”
”Have you ever seen Captain Jameson?”
”We were at college together,” said Dr. Grennell; ”that is the way I happened to come to Fairfax. I got my appointment to this church through Captain Jameson and his father.”
”Then couldn't you go on and see if he is really Judy's father?”
”By George,” said the doctor, ”of course I can. I can make the excuse that I want to visit my old friends. I need an outing, too.”
”I wish I could go with you,” said Launcelot, wistfully, as the two walked down the road, after having perfected plans for the doctor's trip. ”I am getting awfully tired of this place, doctor. You see my life abroad was so different, and I feel as if I ought to be doing something worth while.”
”Just now the thing that is worth while is for you to be a good son and stay here,” said Dr. Grennell. ”You can be nothing greater than that.
And you are doing it like a hero,” and his hand dropped affectionately on the boy's shoulder.
”Well, it's deadly dull,” said the hero resignedly, as he thought of Anne and Judy speeding away to the coolness of the sea. But presently he cheered up. ”It will be great if it does happen to be Captain Jameson,” he said, ”and just think if Judy hadn't run away we wouldn't have seen her coin, and if I had waited that morning she wouldn't have run away, and if I hadn't been cross I would have waited--how about that for a moral, Doctor.”
”There is no moral,” said the minister, ”but all bad tempers don't turn out so well.”
”It sounds like,
”'Fire, fire burn stick, Stick, stick beat dog, Dog, dog bite pig--'