My Very Dearest Master-Jervie-Daddy-Long-Legs Pendleton-Smith,
Did you sleep last night? I didn't. Not a single wink. I was too
amazed and excited and bewildered and happy. I don't believe I ever
shall sleep again--or eat either. But I hope you slept; you must, you
know, because then you will get well faster and can come to me.
Dear Man, I can't bear to think how ill you've been--and all the time I
never knew it. When the doctor came down yesterday to put me in the
cab, he told me that for three days they gave you up. Oh, dearest, if
that had happened, the light would have gone out of the world for me.
I suppose that some day in the far future--one of us must leave the
other; but at least we shall have had our happiness and there will be
memories to live with.
I meant to cheer you up--and instead I have to cheer myself. For in
spite of being happier than I ever dreamed I could be, I'm also
soberer. The fear that something may happen rests like a shadow on my
heart. Always before I could be frivolous and care-free and
unconcerned, because I had nothing precious to lose. But now--I shall
have a Great Big Worry all the rest of my life. Whenever you are away
from me I shall be thinking of all the automobiles that can run over
you, or the sign-boards that can fall on your head, or the dreadful,
squirmy germs that you may be swallowing. My peace of mind is gone for
ever--but anyway, I never cared much for just plain peace.
Please get well--fast--fast--fast. I want to have you close by where I
can touch you and make sure you are tangible. Such a little half hour
we had together! I'm afraid maybe I dreamed it. If I were only a
member of your family (a very distant fourth cousin) then I could come
and visit you every day, and read aloud and plump up your pillow and
smooth out those two little wrinkles in your forehead and make the
corners of your mouth turn up in a nice cheerful smile. But you are
cheerful again, aren't you? You were yesterday before I left. The
doctor said I must be a good nurse, that you looked ten years younger.
I hope that being in love doesn't make every one ten years younger.
Will you still care for me, darling, if I turn out to be only eleven?
Yesterday was the most wonderful day that could ever happen. If I live
to be ninety-nine I shall never forget the tiniest detail. The girl
that left Lock Willow at dawn was a very different person from the one
who came back at night. Mrs. Semple called me at half-past four. I
started wide awake in the darkness and the first thought that popped
into my head was, 'I am going to see Daddy-Long-Legs!' I ate breakfast
in the kitchen by candle-light, and then drove the five miles to the
station through the most glorious October colouring. The sun came up
on the way, and the swamp maples and dogwood glowed crimson and orange
and the stone walls and cornfields sparkled with hoar frost; the air
was keen and clear and full of promise. I knew something was going to
happen. All the way in the train the rails kept singing, 'You're going
to see Daddy-Long-Legs.' It made me feel secure. I had such faith in
Daddy's ability to set things right. And I knew that somewhere another
man--dearer than Daddy--was wanting to see me, and somehow I had a
feeling that before the journey ended I should meet him, too. And you
see!
When I came to the house on Madison Avenue it looked so big and brown
and forbidding that I didn't dare go in, so I walked around the block
to get up my courage. But I needn't have been a bit afraid; your
butler is such a nice, fatherly old man that he made me feel at home at
once. 'Is this Miss Abbott?' he said to me, and I said, 'Yes,' so I
didn't have to ask for Mr. Smith after all. He told me to wait in the
drawing-room. It was a very sombre, magnificent, man's sort of room. I
sat down on the edge of a big upholstered chair and kept saying to
myself:
'I'm going to see Daddy-Long-Legs! I'm going to see Daddy-Long-Legs!'
Then presently the man came back and asked me please to step up to the
library. I was so excited that really and truly my feet would hardly
take me up. Outside the door he turned and whispered, 'He's been very
ill, Miss. This is the first day he's been allowed to sit up. You'll
not stay long enough to excite him?' I knew from the way he said it
that he loved you--and I think he's an old dear!
Then he knocked and said, 'Miss Abbott,' and I went in and the door
closed behind me.
It was so dim coming in from the brightly lighted hall that for a
moment I could scarcely make out anything; then I saw a big easy chair
before the fire and a shining tea table with a smaller chair beside it.
And I realized that a man was sitting in the big chair propped up by
pillows with a rug over his knees. Before I could stop him he
rose--rather shakily--and steadied himself by the back of the chair and
just looked at me without a word. And then--and then--I saw it was
you! But even with that I didn't understand. I thought Daddy had had
you come there to meet me or a surprise.
Then you laughed and held out your hand and said, 'Dear little Judy,
couldn't you guess that I was Daddy-Long-Legs?'
In an instant it flashed over me. Oh, but I have been stupid! A
hundred little things might have told me, if I had had any wits. I
wouldn't make a very good detective, would I, Daddy? Jervie? What
must I call you? Just plain Jervie sounds disrespectful, and I can't
be disrespectful to you!
It was a very sweet half hour before your doctor came and sent me away.
I was so dazed when I got to the station that I almost took a train for
St Louis. And you were pretty dazed, too. You forgot to give me any
tea. But we're both very, very happy, aren't we? I drove back to Lock
Willow in the dark but oh, how the stars were shining! And this
morning I've been out with Colin visiting all the places that you and I
went to together, and remembering what you said and how you looked.
The woods today are burnished bronze and the air is full of frost.
It's CLIMBING weather. I wish you were here to climb the hills with
me. I am missing you dreadfully, Jervie dear, but it's a happy kind of
missing; we'll be together soon. We belong to each other now really
and truly, no make-believe. Doesn't it seem queer for me to belong to
someone at last? It seems very, very sweet.
And I shall never let you be sorry for a single instant.
Yours, for ever and ever,
Judy
PS. This is the first love-letter I ever wrote. Isn't it funny that I
know how?