“Fritz! Fritzy Pickel! What is that you say?” demanded Uncle Fritz, who of all the astonished company was the first to recover his speech.
“He’s dead! Dead as Otto Skaats!” wailed the terrified child. “I fit him and beat him; but I didn’t—I didn’t mean to do it so hard!”
“Otto Skaats” had been the unlucky hero of Uncle Fritz’s doleful tale.
“Come to me, nephew!” ordered Uncle Fritz sternly, and the little boy sorrowfully obeyed.
“Now tell Fritzy Nunky every single thing.” Mr. Pickel sat down upon the sofa and took his favorite into the safe shelter of his arms. Sympathy, he knew, was the shortest road to confidence.
“I went to see the house, and I found a boy. He was big and crosser than anything. He couldn’t be my truly cousin, Fritzy Nunky, ’cause he wasn’t a gentleman. He ordered me out of his place like he owned the hull concern; and he dasted me to fight. I wanted to lick him, and I did; but I didn’t ’spect to kill him.”
At the recollection of Melville’s white face, the young pugilist hid his own on Uncle Fritz’s broad shoulder and began sobbing as if his heart were broken.
Fortunately, at that moment Aunt Ruth re-entered the room. She had waited to hear but the first words of the little lad’s self-accusation, and had then flown swiftly to Melville’s side. For an instant she had gazed upon the inert figure, horrified, and actually believing that the tale was true. Another instant, and she resisted the thought as something too terrible to have really come into such quiet lives as theirs. She found the death-like stupor only a faint after all; and her heart gave a great throb of thankfulness. She had never loved, and was far too honest to pretend affection for, her elder nephew; but in that moment she realized the truth of the old saying that “blood is thicker than water.” She had not loved him simply because he was not lovable; but a hope arose within her that he might yet become so.
“I’ve been too severe with him, no doubt,” said truthful Ruth to herself; “and I’ve had too great contempt for his supreme selfishness. But who knows? Maybe in his place I should have been a deal more disagreeable—if that were possible!”
This soliloquy had not hindered the work of her capable hands, and very speedily she had the satisfaction of seeing the invalid revive. When he recovered so far as to answer her question, he replied, that ‘he was all right, only his head felt queer.’ “I don’t remember what happened to me. Oh, yes, I do too! Where is that little imp?”