THE LETTER
“What would you give me for a letter from Nebraska,” said Donald a few
days after the Professor’s visit, as he flung himself from his horse and
sat down on the steps of the veranda where Lissa sat, with her lap full
of flowers which she had been gathering.
“O Donald, give it to me quick! I can’t wait a minute,” she cried,
espying the gleam of white sticking from the pocket of his coat.
“But tell me first, before you read it, whether you have any faith in
Professor Russell’s vision,” he said, teasing.
“Yes, no; I don’t know. I can tell better after I have read Alice’s
letter.”
“Of course, but that will not demonstrate your faith. However, I’ll be
good and let you have it.” And Donald placed the coveted missive in her
hand.
With the remembrance of the vision before her, Lissa’s fingers trembled
as she tore open the envelope. The letter would confirm or refute the
truth of the Professor’s clairvoyance. And although she would not admit
for a moment even to herself that she believed in any _spirit_ agency,
she understood so little of clairvoyancy as to believe it connected with
supernatural phenomena.
As she read the letter, her expressive eyes dilated with wonder and awe.
“What is it?” asked Nathan, noticing her agitation.
She placed the written pages in his hand.
“Read that, Nathan, and tell me what to think, what to believe. Read it
aloud that all may hear and judge.”
Nathan took the letter and read as follows:
“‘Cramer Cabin, Prairieland,
“‘August 28, 18—.
“‘My Darling Little Sister:
“‘Don’t you wish you were here with me this summer evening? Outside, the
white stillness of the great prairie woos one to meditation and letter
writing. Now you will expect something poetical and fine, will you not?
Well, the inspiration is here, but alas, I am one of those “Who cannot
sing, but die with all their music in them.” My muse deserted me in my
infancy. Besides I have been having unexpected duties.
“‘Mark is at home laid up with a couple of wounds, not serious ones, I
am happy to say, but such as to give me an opportunity to coddle and pet
him for a time. I am not sure I am _sorry_ he received them, but don’t
whisper this to him.
“‘How did he get them, did you ask? Well, he was away on a hunting
expedition with a band of his Pawnees, when they were surprised by some
Sioux. Mark got a flesh wound in his shoulder from a tomahawk blow, and
a bullet grazed him in the left side. Close call, wasn’t it? The
skirmish was on the bank of the Niobrara, where Mark’s party had fled
for shelter, and he managed to get under water until a clump of
hazel-brush enabled him to climb out and hide. He was too exhausted from
the loss of blood to fight any longer. However, his men drove off the
Sioux and found him and brought him home. Mark says I have represented
him in a cowardly position. I hope not. He was in a dead faint when the
men found him. Anyway, I don’t see any bravery in standing up to have
your scalp taken off by a savage, do you? But men are so very sensitive
upon those points.
“‘I can hardly wait for your arrival. Mark says I act like a crazy woman
whenever I speak of it. O Lissa, Lissa, Lissa! We’re out of the world
here, but I am sure you will enjoy it. I hug myself with delight
whenever I think of seeing you so soon.’”
Nathan paused in his reading.
“It is wonderful,” he said. “Professor Russell must have seen the entire
skirmish.”
“Yes,” responded Lissa, “unless he may have heard of it in some way.
Alice does not say upon what day Mark was hurt.”
“Ah, you are yet a doubting Thomas,” Nathan said, smiling fondly upon
the winsome upturned face of his girl-wife.
“No, only looking for a peg to hang a doubt upon. Nathan, I am very
anxious to get to our new home.”
“My dear, we shall be there in a fortnight. I must wait until the wagon
is finished, you know. I hope, little one, you will not be disappointed
when you see what a _poor_ home it is,” he continued, shaking his head
doubtfully.
“I shall not be. Read the rest of Alice’s letter.”
Nathan continued his reading:
“‘Just think, sister, of having no social barriers or stiff
conventionalities to hamper one. No fussing to prepare elaborate
toilets, no two-minute fashionable calls to make, no questioning as to
what one shall wear. I am happy and well-dressed for any occasion in my
pink gingham. It is a pretty gingham, and made up prettily, I assure
you, as I made it myself. Then, we are all so well acquainted with one
another, and call each other by the first names, and run about to each
other’s houses whenever we please and stay as long as we please, and
talk about our chickens and ponies, and—and—O Lissa, dear, you cannot
realize what a free, wild life this is. And the air is so pure and
invigorating.’”
“And there’s plenty of it,” interpolated Donald.
“Yes, too much, sometimes,” said Nathan.
“Now don’t, Nate! Don’t say a word to discourage me. If I were going to
Kansas I should be afraid of cyclones, but I am sure we shall have none
in Nebraska.”
“And if we should, you know we have the _dug-out_,” Nathan replied.
“I’d really advise you, Lissa, to arrange to sleep all the time in the
_dug-out_. It would be so uncomfortable to wake up some morning and find
yourself occupying some one else’s farm or tree-top,” said Donald.
Lissa smiled indulgently, but made no reply, and Nathan continued
reading the letter.