A FRUITLESS JOURNEY.
It was the afternoon when Sullivan’s letter, on the lower left hand
corner of which he had written _Har., Sul.,_ arrived. Mr. Colman had
gone to a town at some distance, whence he would not return till the
last train. Not many letters came to him, and this, with the London
postmark, naturally drew the attention of Aunt Ann and Molly. The moment
the eyes of the former fell on the contracted name in the corner, they
blazed.
“The shameless fellow!” she cried; “writing to beg another ten-pound
note from my poor foolish brother!”
“I don’t think that is it, aunt,” returned Molly.
“And why not, pray? How should you know?”
“Mr. Sullivan has had plenty of work, and can not need to borrow money.
Why are you so suspicious, auntie?”
“I am not. I never was suspicious. You are a rude girl to say so! If it
is not money, you may depend upon it, it is something worse!”
“What worse can you mean?”
“That Walter has got into some scrape.”
“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 scrap 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 Hancock 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 God 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 Hancock. “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.
“You are mistaken, auntie,” she said. “I am going to open it.”
“You shall do nothing of the sort--not if I live!” returned Aunt Ann,
and flew to take the letter from her. But Molly was prepared for the
attack, and was on the other side of the door before she could pounce.
She sped to her room, locked the door, and read the letter, then went
instantly to her bonnet and cloak. There was time to catch the last
train! She inclosed the letter, addressed it to her father, and wrote
inside the envelope that she had opened it against the wish of her aunt,
and was gone to nurse Walter. Then taking money from her drawer, she
returned to Aunt Ann.
“It is about Walter. He is very ill,” she said. “I have inclosed the
letter, and told him it was I that opened it.”
“Why such a fuss?” cried Aunt Ann. “You can tell him your impertinence
just as well as write it! Oh, you’ve got your bonnet on!--going to run
away in a fright at what you’ve done! Well, perhaps you’d better!”
“I am going to Walter.”
“_Where?_”
“To London to Walter.”
“You!”
“Yes; who else?”
“You shall _not_. I will go myself!”
Molly knew too well how Walter felt toward his aunt to consent to this.
She would doubtless behave kindly if she found him really ill, but she
would hardly be a comfort to him!
“I shall be ready in one moment!” continued Miss Hancock. “There is
plenty of time, and you can drive me to the station if you like. Richard
shall not say I left the care of his son to a chit of a girl!”
Molly said nothing, but rushed to the stable. Nobody was there! She
harnessed the horse, and put him to the dog-cart with her own hands, in
terror lest her aunt should be ready before her.
She was driving from the yard when her aunt appeared, in her Sunday
best.
“That’s right!” she said, expecting her to pull up and take her in.
But Molly touched up her horse, and he, having done nothing for some
time, was fresh, and started at speed. Aunt Ann was left standing, but
it was some time before she understood that the horse had not run away.
Ere Molly reached the station, she left the dog-cart at a neighboring
inn, then told one of the porters, to whom her father was well known, to
look out for him by the last train, and let him know where the trap was.
As the train was approaching London, it stopped at a station where
already stood another train, bound in the opposite direction, which
began to move while hers stood. Molly was looking out of her window, as
it went past her with the slow beginnings of speed, watching the faces
that drifted by, in a kind of phantasmagoric show, never more to be
repeated, when, in the further corner of a third-class carriage near the
end of the train, she caught sight of a huddled figure that reminded her
of Walter; a pale face was staring as if it saw nothing, but dreamed of
something it could not see. She jumped up and put her head out of the
window, but her own train also was now moving, and if it were Walter,
there was no possibility of overtaking him. She was by no means sure,
however, that it was he. The only way was to go on to her journey’s end!