I got a look at the bed then, and there was something on the pillow. I showed it to him. It was a letter.
If you've ever seen a man shot, you know how it gets him. He'll stand for a time like he ain't hurt so bad. Then his face'll pucker, surprised, and he'll begin to crumble down slow. That was the way Old Man Wright done when he read the letter. It was like he was shot and trying to stand and couldn't, only a little while.
"She's—she's gone!" says he, like he was talking, to someone else. "She's run away—from me! She's gone, Curly!" He says it over again, and this time so loud you could of heard it for a block. "Our girl's left here—left her father after all! Curly, tell me, what was this? Could she—did she—— How could she?"
I taken the piece of paper from his hand when he didn't see me. It said:
Father [I never knew her to call him that before] Father, I'm going away. I'm a thief. I've broken your heart and Curly's and Tom's. I'm the wickedest girl in the world; and I'll never ask your forgiveness, for I don't deserve it. You must not look for me any more. I'm going away. Good-by!
Well, that was all. The letter had been all over wet—and a man can't cry.
"Curly," says her pa to me—"why, Curly, it can't be! She's hiding—she's just joking; she wouldn't do this with her old pa. She's scared me awful. Come on, let's find her, and tell her she mustn't do this way no more. There's some things a man can't stand."
"Colonel," says I, "we got to stand it. She's gone and it ain't no joke."
"How do you know?" He turned on me savage now. "Damn you! What do you know? There's nothing wrong about my girl—you don't dare to tell me that there is! She couldn't do no wrong; it wasn't in her."
"No," says I; "she wouldn't do anything but what she thought was right, I reckon. But, you see, you and me, we never knew her at all. I didn't till last night about half past twelve or one o'clock."