A HARD PROMISE
A DOZEN times in Georgina's day-dreaming she had imagined this scene.
She had run to Uncle Darcy with the proof of Dan's innocence, heard his
glad cry, seen his face fairly transfigured as he read the confession
aloud. Now it was actually happening before her very eyes, but where was
the scene of heavenly gladness that should have followed?
Belle, startled even more than he by Georgina's outcry, and quicker to
act, read the message over his shoulder, recognized the handwriting and
grasped the full significance of the situation before he reached the
name at the end. For ten years three little notes in that same peculiar
hand had lain in her box of keepsakes. There was no mistaking that
signature. She had read it and cried over it so many times that now as
it suddenly confronted her with its familiar twists and angles it was as
startling as if Emmett's voice had called to her.
As Uncle Darcy looked up from the second reading, with a faltering
exclamation of thanksgiving, she snatched the paper from his shaking
hands and tore it in two. Then crumpling the pieces and flinging them
from her, she seized him by the wrists.
"No, you're _not_ going to tell the whole world," she cried wildly,
answering the announcement he made with the tears raining down his
cheeks. "You're not going to tell anybody! Think of me! Think of Father
Potter!"
She almost screamed her demand. He could hardly believe it was Belle,
this frenzied girl, who, heretofore, had seemed the gentlest of souls.
He looked at her in a dazed way, so overwhelmed by the discovery that
had just been made, that he failed to comprehend the reason for her
white face and agonized eyes, till she threw up her arms crying:
"_Emmett_ a thief! God in heaven! It'll kill me!"
It was the sight of Georgina's shocked face with Richard's at the door,
that made things clear to the old man. He waved them away, with hands
which shook as if he had the palsy.
"Go on out, children, for a little while," he said gently, and closed
the door in their faces.
Slowly they retreated to the swing, Georgina clasping the skinned elbow
which had begun to smart. She climbed into one seat of the swing and
Richard and Captain Kidd took the other. As they swung back and forth
she demanded in a whisper:
"Why is it that grown people always shut children out of their secrets?
Seems as if we have a right to know what's the matter when _we_ found
the paper."
Richard made no answer, for just then the sound of Belle's crying came
out to them. The windows of the cottage were all open and the grass plot
between the windows and the swing being a narrow one the closed door
was of little avail. It was very still there in the shady dooryard, so
still that they could hear old Yellownose purr, asleep on the cushion in
the wooden arm-chair beside the swing. The broken sentences between the
sobs were plainly audible. It seemed so terrible to hear a grown person
cry, that Georgina felt as she did that morning long ago, when old
Jeremy's teeth flew into the fire. Her confidence was shaken in the
world. She felt there could be no abiding happiness in anything.
"She's begging him not to tell," whispered Richard.
"But I owe it to Danny," they heard Uncle Darcy say. And then, "Why
should I spare Emmett's father? Emmett never spared me, he never spared
Danny."
An indistinct murmur as if Belle's answer was muffled in her
handkerchief, then Uncle Darcy's voice again:
"It isn't fair that the town should go on counting him a hero and brand
my boy as a coward, when it's Emmett who was the coward as well as the
thief."
Again Belle's voice in a quick cry of pain, as sharp as if she had been
struck. Then the sound of another door shutting, and when the voices
began again it was evident they had withdrawn into the kitchen.
"They don't want Aunt Elspeth to hear," said Georgina.
"What's it all about?" asked Richard, much mystified.
Georgina told him all that she knew herself, gathered from the scraps
she had heard the day of Cousin Mehitable's visit, and from various
sources since; told him in a half whisper stopping now and then when
some fragment of a sentence floated out to them from the kitchen; for
occasional words still continued to reach them through the windows in
the rear, when the voices rose at intervals to a higher pitch.
What passed behind those closed doors the children never knew. They felt
rather than understood what was happening. Belle's pleading was
beginning to be effectual, and the old man was rising to the same
heights of self-sacrifice which Dan had reached, when he slipped away
from home with the taint of his friend's disgrace upon him in order to
save that friend.
That some soul tragedy had been enacted in that little room the children
felt vaguely when Belle came out after a while. Her eyes were red and
swollen and her face drawn and pinched looking. She did not glance in
their direction, but stood with her face averted and hand on the
gate-latch while Uncle Darcy stopped beside the swing.
"Children," he said solemnly, "I want you to promise me never to speak
to anyone about finding that note in the old rifle till I give you
permission. Will you do this for me, just because I ask it, even if I
can't tell you why?"
"Mustn't I even tell Barby?" asked Georgina, anxiously.
He hesitated, glancing uncertainly at Belle, then answered:
"No, not even your mother, till I tell you that you can. Now you see
what a very important secret it is. Can _you_ keep it, son? Will you
promise me too?"
He turned to Richard with the question. With a finger under the boy's
chin he tipped up his face and looked into it searchingly. The serious,
brown eyes looked back into his, honest and unflinching.
"Yes, I promise," he answered. "Honor bright I'll not tell."
The old man turned to the waiting figure at the gate.
"It's all right, Belle. You needn't worry about it any more. You can
trust us."
She made no answer, but looking as if she had aged years in the last
half hour, she passed through the gate and into the sandy court, moving
slowly across it towards the street beyond.
With a long-drawn sigh the old man sank down on the door-step and buried
his face in his hands. They were still shaking as if he had the palsy.
For some time the children sat in embarrassed silence, thinking every
moment that he would look up and say something. They wanted to go, but
waited for him to make some movement. He seemed to have forgotten they
were there. Finally a clock inside the cottage began striking five. It
broke the spell which bound them.
"Let's go," whispered Richard.
"All right," was the answer, also whispered. "Wait till I take the
shovel and can lid back to the kitchen."
"I'll take 'em," he offered. "I want to get a drink, anyhow."
Stealthily, as if playing Indian, they stepped out of the swing and
tiptoed through the grass around the corner of the house. Even the dog
went noiselessly, instead of frisking and barking as he usually did when
starting anywhere. Their return was equally stealthy. As they slipped
through the gate Georgina looked back at the old man. He was still
sitting on the step, his face in his hands, as if he were bowed down by
some weight too heavy for his shoulders to bear.
The weary hopelessness of his attitude made her want to run back and
throw her arms around his neck, but she did not dare. Trouble as great
as that seemed to raise a wall around itself. It could not be comforted
by a caress. The only thing to do was to slip past and not look.
Richard shared the same awe, for he went away leaving the rifle lying in
the grass. Instinctively he felt that it ought not to be played with
now. It was the rifle which had changed everything.