CHAPTER XIV
THE LETTER
The boys were still examining the violin when they were arrested by a little broken wail. They turned to see their mother crying over an open letter.
With a bound Blue was at her side. “What is it? What is the matter?” he demanded.
“He was—your Uncle Jim!” She put her handkerchief to her eyes, and began to sob.
“Uncle Jim?—her husband?” Blue’s astonished voice sounded strangely unnatural.
The mother assented. “I knew his handwriting—the minute I saw the envelope. I was afraid of it when Mr. Gaylord told me the name—oh, if I’d only known! Now it’s too late!” She dropped her head to the cruel edge of the trunk, and wept aloud. “It serves me right! I held myself above her—just because she danced in a theater! O God, forgive me! I’ve got my pay for being so high and mighty! There I could have found out all about my dear brother if I’d treated her like a Christian! And I left her to die alone—my own sister-in-law!”
Mrs. Stickney’s remorse was pitiful to see. Blue did not know what to say, but stood there, silent and uneasy.
“Don’t cry, mother dear!” pleaded Doodles. “You didn’t know, and I guess I comforted her—so that’s just the same.”
“No, no, it isn’t, you blessed child! I’m a wicked woman; but I’m glad as can be that you went to see her, and sung to her. That’s my only consolation. And I shouldn’t have let you go if I’d had my way! Oh, what did make me so heathenish!”
Later, when the violence of her grief had subsided, she read to the boys what was doubtless their uncle’s last letter to his wife.