Volume Ii Part 47 (1/2)
It was good time yet in the afternoon, and though the little boat now lay partly shadowed by the hill, it was none the worse resting place for that. Again Faith was seated there in all the style that shawls and cus.h.i.+ons furnished, and just tired enough to feel luxurious in the soft atmosphere. Mr. Linden arranged and established her to his liking; then he took out of his pocket a letter.
It was one which had been opened and read; but as he unfolded it, there appeared another--unopened, unread; its dainty seal unbroken, and on the back in fair tracery, the words, ”Miss Faith Derrick.” As Faith read them and saw the hand, her eye glanced first up at Mr. Linden with its mute burden of surprise, and then the roses bloomed out over her cheeks and even threw their flush upon her brow. Her eye was cast down now and fixed on the unopened letter, with the softest fall of its eyelid.
”Shall I read you a part of mine first?”
”If you please. I wish you would.”
”Only a little bit,” he said smiling--thinking perhaps that she did not know to what she gave her a.s.sent so readily,--”you shall read the whole of it another time.” The ”little bit” began rather abruptly.
”'I have written to your darling, Endy--Not much, tell her; because what I have in my heart for her cannot be told. I know how precious any one must be whom you love so much. But make her love me a little before she reads my letter--and don't let her call me anything but Pet--and then I shall feel as if I had a sister already. And so I have, as you say. What a glad word!--I could cry again with the very writing of it.
'Endy--I did cry a little over your letter, but only for joy: if it had been for sorrow I should have cried long ago; for I knew well enough what was coming. Only I want more than ever to be at home,--and to see you, and to see Faith--don't let her think I am like you!
'My letter wouldn't hold much, as I told you. But I give you any number of (unspeakable!) messages for her, John Endy. I suppose you will take charge of them? I may feel sure they have all reached their destination?'”
Long before the reading was finished, Faith's head had sunk--almost to the cus.h.i.+ons beside her. The reader's voice and intonation had given every word a sort of ring in her heart, though the tone was low. One hand came round her when she put her head down, taking possession of her hand which lay so still, with the unopened letter in its clasp. But now she was gently raised up.
”Precious child,” Mr. Linden said, ”what are you drooping your head for?”
”For the same reason she had, I suppose,--” said Faith half laughing, though witnesses of another kind were in her eyes.
”Who are you talking about?”
”Your sister.”
”Why don't you begin to practise your lesson?”
Perhaps Faith thought that she _was_. She looked at nothing but her letter.
”Will you wait for your messages till we get home?--this place not being absolute seclusion.”
”Shall I read this now?” said Faith rather hastily.
”I should think there would be no danger in that.”
With somewhat unsteady fingers, that yet tried to be quiet, Faith broke the seal; and masking her glowing face with one hand, she bent over the letter to read it.
”My very dear, and most unknown, and most well-known little sister! I have had a picture sent me of you--as you appeared one night, when you sat for your portrait, hearing Portia; and with it a notice of several events which occurred just before that time. And both picture and events have gone down into my heart, and abide there. Endecott says you are a Sunbeam--and I feel as if a little of the light had come over the water to me,--ever since his letter came I have been in a state of absolute reflection!
”I thought my love would not be the first to 'find out the way'--even then when I wrote it! Faith--do you know that there is n.o.body in the world just like him? because if you do not--you will find it out!--I mean! like Endecott--_not_ like Love. My dear, I beg pardon for my p.r.o.noun! But just how _I_ have loved you all these months, for making him so happy, I cannot tell you.
”And I cannot write to-day--about anything,--my thoughts are in too uneven a flow to find their way to the end of my pen, and take all possible flights instead. Dear Faith, you must wait for a _letter_ till the next steamer. And you cannot miss it--nor anything else, with Endecott there,--it seems to me that to be even in the same country with him is happiness.
”You must love me too, Faith, and not think me a stranger,--and let me be your (because I am Endy's)
”PET.”