Part 10

“I find that I shall have to go away for I ment what I said wen you gave me my money tonight. It would be beastly to go to that miletary-camp and I cant studdy and keep things up in the way that is expected it makes my headache. Perhaps there is something the matter with that part of my bran wich I have inherited from you. But dont worry this will not keep me from being a good bizness man wich has always been the fate I have most wished for. I am sorry to have made so much trubble and Ill come back some day. Dont let Georgie forget me and dont you forget me either

“Your loving son “Geoffrey Meadows Graham.”

I wanted to cry as I read it. Poor, blundering, affectionate Geof, with his atrocious spelling and his “inherited bran.”

Mother handed the note to Uncle George again, without a word.

“Well?” he asked, shortly.

“It is very like Geoffrey,” she said; “though I never could have supposed he would run away. What are you going to do?”

“I, myself,” returned Uncle George, “would prefer to wait and give the young beggar a chance to grow tired of his experiment. That’s the medicine he needs. A chap who can throw over a good home such as Geoffrey has, ought to be made to rough it a bit. But the women folk won’t hear of it. Meta and her mother are in a great taking. They imagine all sorts of foolishness, and it’s on account of them, more especially, that I have come over to interview your Ernie. Come, young woman! What have you got to say for yourself? Do you know anything of Geoffrey’s whereabouts?”

Again Ernie flushed crimson, lowered her eyelids, and remained silent.

“I have already questioned Ernestine,” said mother. “She undoubtedly knows certain facts which would be very useful. I hope that I shall be able to convince her it is her duty to tell us.”

Uncle George looked from mother to Ernie in blank amazement. “Do you mean to say she won’t tell?” he demanded. “Then there is only one way out of it. She must be made to.”

“I shall try to show Ernie that it is the only way in which she can be of any help to Geoffrey,” answered mother, quietly.

Uncle George frowned impatiently.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said, after a moment’s thought. “I’ll give her a five-dollar gold piece for the first bit of information she has to give us. What’s more, I’ll make it twenty-five dollars, if it leads to Geoffrey’s capture before night. What do you say to that, my girl?”

It would be impossible to describe the look of horror depicted in Ernie’s features. Betray Geof, her dear chum, her more than brother, for a sordid money reward! If Uncle George had only known it, our last chance of winning Ernie was lost when he uttered those hateful words. But he did not know, and it would have been impossible to make him understand. On the contrary, he picked up his hat with a satisfied expression of having set things on the right track, at last, and after a final injunction “to keep him informed,” left us.

Mother and I looked hopelessly at one another as the front door closed behind him.

“Ernie, dear,” said mother, very gently, “setting aside all thought of Uncle George’s offer, for, of course, it is out of the question that you should accept any money,—I expect you to tell me at once all you know in regard to Geoffrey’s plans. It may be the means of saving him great hardship, and discomfort.”

“Yes, Ernie,” I urged. “And everybody is agreed that it is much better to break a bad promise than to keep it. Doesn’t your own common-sense tell you that?”

But reason, command, entreat as we might, Ernie remained obdurate.

She sat on the top stair leading down to the basement, the big tears welling in her blue eyes and trickling along her nose till they dropped from the tip with a little splash into her lap; listening plaintively to all we said, replying nothing,—a moving picture of stubborn misery.

At last mother desisted.

“Ernie,” she said, “I want you distinctly to understand that I am both disappointed and displeased with you. You are the one person who can be of any help to Geoffrey; but I shall ask you no further questions. When your own good feeling and sense of right prompt you to follow my wishes, I shall be ready to listen to you.”

Then mother dressed and went to see Aunt Adelaide; I ran up to the nursery to Robin; and Ernie locked herself in the workshop, where she set to work painting a gorgeous family of Japanese paper dolls for Mary Hobart’s birthday,—spattering their beflowered kimonos ever and again with a salty drop. She was very forlorn, poor darling;—distressed beyond measure to feel that her family disapproved of her. Yet she had given her word to Geof.

So the morning passed. Lunch time came, and still there was no news. The afternoon dragged even more heavily; and when Hazard came home from the office in the evening he told us that Uncle George had three detectives looking for Geof, but as yet they had found no clue.

Dinner was somewhat of an ordeal. I had the head of the table, as mother did not feel she could leave Aunt Adelaide, who is in a very apprehensive and nervous state. We tried to keep the conversation to general topics, but the anecdotal vein of the boarders was not to be stemmed. It seems that Geoffrey’s escapade reminded everybody of some long-forgotten incident in his or her own family, or the family of a friend, or even a friend’s friend.

Nothing was too far-fetched to be appropriate, every possible climax to the adventure was predicted, and the same heartening conversation continued when we gathered in the parlour after dinner to wait for news. Till, finally, about half-past ten or so, the boarders began to disperse to their rooms;—yet not before Mr. Lysle had made a brief, though painful, effort to win Ernie’s confidence; for she is a favourite with the kind “Hippopotamus,” and it grieved him to know her in disgrace.

Therefore, interrupting his sister, who was condoling with Miss Brown over the sad fate of a nephew of the latter’s mother’s aunt, who eloped with a sea captain’s daughter some sixty years ago, and was finally eaten up by whales off the Cape of Good Hope (I believe it was thus the thrilling story ran), Mr. Lysle, with a sly wink at his wife over the top of his newspaper, began:

“Miss Ernie! ahem!”

Ernie looked up from her “home-work,” and the “Hippopotamus” continued ponderously:

“I suppose you are familiar with the famous anecdote of George Washington and his hatchet? How, when still a young boy, the Father of Our Country found it impossible, even with the fear of stern chastisement before him, to tell a—er—a—lie?”

Ernie cautiously refusing to commit herself to any previous acquaintance with the incident, Mr. Lysle continued blandly:—

“Now, my dear child, a similar opportunity is presented to you,—an opportunity such as you may never meet again—a grand opportunity! a great one! The path of truth is a path of roses, for all that it has its thorns,—even, if I may say so, because of them!”

He paused impressively, and looked Ernie firmly in the eye. We, the audience, waited breathless, but still Mr. Lysle did not speak. So, supposing, at last, the homily must be concluded, we were about to return to our various avocations, when he positively thundered forth:

“_Where_ is your Cousin Geoffrey? Where is that wilful lad? Speak! I command you!”

Everybody in the room jumped, and Miss Lysle, who is nervous, uttered an hysterical little squawk, like a frightened hen.

Ernie alone remained undaunted. The poor “Hippopotamus” continued to gaze at her, triumph fading to chagrin, till, finally, he turned to his wife with such a disappointed air:—

“I thought I could surprise it out of her,” he said; “but, evidently, I—er—couldn’t!” And a few moments later he bade us a subdued “good-night” and was soon followed upstairs by the rest of the boarders.

It seems too strange to be sitting here writing these things, with no idea where Geoffrey may be! If only I did not feel my own responsibility so keenly! I can see now that I should have told mother last Tuesday when first I heard of Geof’s trou——. There is the bell! It may be news....

* * * * *

Yes! and good news, too. Geoffrey is found! He was brought home about eleven o’clock by one of Uncle George’s detectives, who ran across him in a little out-of-the-way cottage in Elizabeth, where he had spent the day with a German woman, who was once a cook at Uncle George’s when Geoffrey’s own mother was alive. She is married now, and has a neat little home of her own, with three fat German babies.

There Geoffrey arrived late last night, and to-morrow morning he had planned to set out again on his travels and beat his way to South Dakota, where Mrs. Prendergast, the German woman, has a brother who works on a cattle ranch! Think of it!

Dear little Ernie broke down completely when she heard of Geoffrey’s capture. She threw herself into mother’s arms, sobbing convulsively:—

“I didn’t mean to be naughty, mother dear! I didn’t! And, of course, you know best—only I had given my word, you see, and then Uncle George might have _made_ me take that hateful money! Oh, what are they going to do to Geoffrey!”

“There! there, dear!” said mother. “Don’t cry so. It is all over now. And as to Geoffrey, you need not worry. Aunt Adelaide and Uncle George are only too anxious to forgive him. He has acted very wrongly, and given us all a great fright; but it has been a lesson to everybody concerned, and I don’t think Uncle George holds Geoffrey entirely responsible.”

And later, after Ernie had snuggled down in bed, where she dropped at once into an exhausted sleep, mother confided to me that she, as well as Aunt Adelaide, fears that Geoffrey is going to be ill.

He seemed quite unlike himself this evening—indifferent and almost dazed, and he still complained of headache. Aunt Adelaide sent him at once to bed, and this morning, if he is not better, he is to see a doctor.

I say this morning, because it is already nearly two o’clock. My eyes are sticky with sleep. I cannot write another word, except to add that even if Geof is to be ill, we are all thankful!

Tuesday, February 17.

Geoffrey has typhoid fever. So,—mother and Aunt Adelaide were right. Oh, why could we not have suspected before? The doctor says the disease has been coming on for months;—which accounts for Geof’s headaches, his sleepless nights, his general indifference and lassitude. And we know, too, now, that he never would have tried to run away, never would have frightened us so, had he been himself.

How hard and unsympathetic we must have seemed these last weeks; for he was sick, poor dear, and dazed, and stupid. He could not explain, and we would not understand.

Well, we are going to be good to him, at last, and make up,—Meta, Aunt Adelaide, all of us. “Only,” says Ernie, with an anxious little frown (it was she who brought the news this morning before school), “we will have to wait a while, I guess. Meta says Miss Barron, the trained nurse, is a regular tyrant. She won’t let any one near Geof.”

It seems that Meta wanted to go to Geoffrey and apologise as soon as she heard that he had typhoid. The memory of their various scraps and misunderstandings troubled her. She made quite a point of the matter, till Miss Barron said it was out of the question. Then Meta determined she would slip in on the sly,—for she is very wilful, once she gets an idea into her head. So she watched her chance, stole up when no one was on guard, got as far as the door, and peeped in.

The room was quite dark. Geoffrey’s head was swathed in towels and an ice-bag; he kept turning it from side to side upon the pillow. His eyes were staring open, and he was muttering to himself in an odd hoarse voice. Suddenly he caught sight of Meta, who was advancing on tip-toe into the room, started up on his elbow, and shouted “_Scat!!_”

She turned and ran, poor thing, right into Uncle George, who was coming upstairs with the doctor, and he scolded her, and sent her to her room.

I am afraid Geof is going to be very ill. Dr. Porter, who called to see Robin this afternoon, was extremely uncommunicative. “It is impossible to predict at this stage,” was all we could get him to say. “Fortunately, the boy has a good constitution.”

Wednesday, February 25.

Geof no better. Oh, how can we endure this suspense!

Sunday, March 1.

Geoffrey desperately ill. He is delirious the greater part of the time, or lies in a heavy stupour.

Poor little Ernie, who goes every day for news, crept up to his door yesterday morning, crouched outside, and listened. Geof was singing in a queer, hoarse voice:—

“Forty years on, when afar and asunder, Parted are those who are singing to-day, When you look back and forgetfully wonder, What you were like in your work and your play....”

followed by snatches of the Eton Boating Song. Then he would break off to shout football signals:—

“25, 39, 15—Left-end and Tackle over! 19, 56, 22—You fellows, there! What are you trying for? 19’s a bluff! Can’t you remember what’s told you,—confound it!”

Interspersed with muttered snatches of German, and Latin paradigms. “And, oh,” mourned Ernie, pathetically, “we’ve done dear Geof a great injustice, Elizabeth. It’s amazing all that boy knows! He repeated lines and lines of Cæsar;—I only wish Haze could have heard him!—and strings of irregular French verbs, and then began to say the Capitals of the States, and exports and imports! It was simply wonderful! I felt so proud!”

But mother and I are frightened. Geof never would have known such things in his right mind, we feel sure; and we suspect that Dr. Porter fears cerebral complications. A consultation was held yesterday, and a second nurse has been engaged to relieve Miss Barron.

Monday, March 9.

The fever has still three weeks to run. It does not seem as if Geof could hold out. Ernie has grown so pale and still these last few days. Mother and I are really anxious about her.

Wednesday, March 18.

I am desperate. I can’t bear it! I can’t! We have just been told that our precious Robin must undergo an operation. Didn’t we have enough to endure without this? Geoffrey so ill,—not past the crisis yet,—and now Bobsie, my own baby, whom I love better than anything in all the world!

God is cruel!... Oh, I don’t know what I am writing! I must calm myself.

* * * * *

This afternoon, after hearing about Robin and trying to write, and giving it up, I put on my hat and jacket and escaped alone to the Park. I walked fast, and just at first I did not notice anything,—the bare branches of the trees against the early sunset sky, the patches of melting snow about the rhododendron bushes, the children playing with their nurses on the common,—till one little fellow with rosy cheeks and shining eyes came running, laughing and shouting over his shoulder, and stumbled against me. “’S’cuse me!” he piped, and shied off again.

It was like a knife in my heart! I wondered stupidly why it should hurt so, and sat down on a bench to think;—and then I knew it was because Robin had never run like that. Oh, he has missed so much in his little life!

I remember perfectly Bobsie’s first birthday. How I woke with a start, before it was yet light, and saw the morning star, big and beautiful, shining in at my window. I sat up in bed, and clasped my knees and blinked at it,—conscious of an unusual stir in the house. Till all at once there rose a little cry! How my heart beat. I jumped out of bed, slipped on my dressing gown and slippers, and crept down the stairs to mother’s door, where I crouched against the wall and listened.

A few moments later the door opened, and Mrs. Parsons, the nurse, poked her head out. “Bless my soul,” she said, “I almost thought you was a ghost, my dear. Run down to the library like a good girl, and tell your pa that everything is all right. It is a fine little boy and your mamma is doing nicely.”

“Oh, nurse,” I breathed, “might I see the baby first?”

“To be sure, you might,” answered Mrs. Parsons. And she went back into the room and returned again with a little white flannel bundle which she laid in my arms.

And I put back a corner of the blanket and peeped in, and there was Robin smiling up at me! His eyes were big and dark, just as they are to-day, and he blinked them. Everybody says it is impossible that Robin should have smiled; but I saw him, and I know. So the next morning, I put away my dolls, and never played with them again. It would have been too stupid, with a real baby to mother, and dress, and sing to.

“She’s crying!” chirped a little voice. For I was thinking of these things as I sat on the bench in the Park; and sure enough the tears were on my face, and I looked up to find three chubby tots standing hand in hand before me, staring in a solemn row.

So then I got up and came home again, since I did not care to make a public spectacle of myself;—and mother met me on the doorstep with outstretched hands, and her own brave smile.

“My darling,” she said, “I meant to spare you; but I am afraid it has come as too much of a shock. Come into the parlour. We will have a cup of cocoa.”

And when I was tucked snugly on the lounge and had wept my little weep where no one could see,—we talked it all out together. What comfortable institutions mothers are!

It seems that if Robin does not have the operation now he can never have it. A few months later would be too late. And though Dr. Porter had hoped to obviate the necessity by a long rest in bed, everything else has failed. There remains this one chance.

“So we must be brave for our baby, Elizabeth,” explained mother. “He is too young to make the decision for himself. The doctor spoke to me of the matter first before Christmas. I would not tell you then, dear, since there seemed a chance of escape, and we had worries enough without adding anything else. But that was why I was so determined not to draw from our little stock of money. _You_ helped me there. Think how thankful we should be that we do not have to borrow, that we can engage a nurse for Robin,—everything that is necessary. He need not even be moved to a hospital, Dr. Porter says. It will all be over in a couple of weeks, and whatever the result there will be the inexpressible comfort of knowing that everything possible has been tried. Are you satisfied? Do you blame me?”

“No, no, indeed!” I answered. “Only,—I think I hate the doctor!”

“Oh, Elizabeth!” smiled mother, as she took my empty cocoa-cup and put it upon the table. “And now I want you to run up to your room, bathe your face, and put on a pretty frock. Mrs. Burroughs has sent over a charming mould of orange jelly and some lady-fingers for Robin. There is to be a tea-party in the nursery, and you and Abraham Lincoln are invited. What do you think of that?”

It was one of mother’s dear, considerate schemes to save my tell-tale eyes from a downstairs dinner. So I kissed her, sped up to my room, dabbed a little powder on the tip of my nose, and donned my forget-me-not dress. Robin’s invitation should be honoured with the best I had.

How his black eyes danced when I entered to him in all my finery:—

“Allow me the Honour of Presenting my Friend, Mr. Abraham Lincoln,” he piped. “There’s the globe, Elizabeth, on the side of the bed. You must pertend to shake hands, and p’raps we can get him to eat a little lady-finger.”

So I pretended to shake hands with the much-enduring Abraham Lincoln, and tempted him with lady-fingers and orange jelly, both of which delicacies he obstinately refused.

“Never mind,” says Robin. “He doesn’t know what’s good. _We_ will eat instead.”

Such a jolly party as it was! We told stories, guessed riddles, and ran races to see who could dispose of the most sandwiches; till even the kind “Hippopotamus” could not have complained of Robin’s appetite. But, at last, he grew tired, and the weary pain returned:

“Take away the party, please, and sing to me, Ellie dear,” he said.

So I carried the tray outside, and came back and sat down by the bed, and with Robin’s thin little hand in mine, sang to him,—all the dear, familiar “heaven hymns” that we have both come to love so well. And Bobsie cuddled up against my arm and closed his eyes and sighed.

And then somehow I knew that if he is not to grow up strong and straight like other boys, if he is to suffer more and more as the years go by, it would be cruel to want to keep Robin. And, oh, I went on singing, and my voice did not once break or trail! So perhaps God will forgive the wicked words I wrote when I was so wild,—for I believe I can be brave now because after a bit Bobsie dropped asleep with his hand still in mine, and—I think, before I left him, that I said “good-bye.”

Sunday, March 22.

It is over. All yesterday morning Ernie and I sat on the attic stairs, holding each other’s hands and trying to feel hopeful.

“He had such a pretty colour in his cheeks last evening,” said Ernie, “and he did _so_ enjoy looking out the window. Buster was there, and John waved his hand before they went away. It was a good sign that the doctor should have let him up in his chair for half an hour,—don’t you think so, Elizabeth? Robin has a lot of vitality.”

“Yes; I know he has,” I agreed. “And if the operation does go well,—how splendid it will be!”

“Somehow one never thinks of Bobsie running about like other boys,” continued Ernie,—“going to school, and playing marbles, and doing errands. I,—I can’t hardly realise it.”

“Neither can I,” I answered, and for a while there was silence between us.

Then Ernie began again:—“How good everybody has been! Uncle George even offered to pay for the operation. I’m glad we didn’t have to accept, though;—and we ought to be very thankful, too, Elizabeth, about the boarders. The oatmeal was burned this morning,—did you notice?—and they never said ‘boo’! Just think, if Mrs. Hudson had been here!”

“I know it,” I answered. “Oh, Ernie, if Robin and Geof pull through, there is not another thing in the world we could dare to ask for!”

“I’ve prayed, and prayed,” returned Ernie, simply. “And I saw Miss Barron yesterday, and she says that Geof is holding his own.”

Then for a long time we were quiet, each thinking her own thoughts. It seemed as the morning would never go.

“Robin isn’t feeling anything at all,” said Ernie, at last. “Dr. Porter promised that. It was to take about an hour, Elizabeth, only, of course, there would be a great deal to get ready first. I must see what time it is. It seems as if we had been sitting here weeks!”

And Ernie opened the hall door and stole out into the light, blinking like a little owl. A moment more and she was back,—very white and scared.

“It smells so of chloroform,” she confessed. “I,—I didn’t quite reach the clock.”

So then we shut the door again, and waited a long, long while; till, at last, we heard mother call:—

“Elizabeth! Ernestine!”

I sat quite still, but Ernie ran down and threw back the door:—“We are here, mother dear, on the attic stairs.”

“Oh, my poor lambs,” said mother, with a little catch in her voice. “Couldn’t you have found a more comfortable place to wait? But it is over, now. Dr. Porter declares the operation a complete success; and Robin has come out from the anæsthetic beautifully!”

“Oh!” gasped Ernie. And then, with a quick little cry,—“Elizabeth! _Elizabeth!_”

I couldn’t see why she should be calling me, when I was right there sitting on the top step looking down at her. Till....

The next thing I knew they had me on the attic floor, a pungent scent of ammonia at my nose, while Ernie poured cold water down my neck in a vain attempt to get me to swallow, and mother relieved me of my collar-button.

“Go away!” I murmured, crossly. “I am only resting.”

“Then do it with your eyes open,” commanded Ernie. “We aren’t used to fainters in this family!”