“But I am not the ‘you’ she meant, you know, Josephine.”
“Well, you’re somebody, aren’t you? You’re my Uncle Joe, anyway, whether you’re the regular one or not. Shall I?” and she held the box edgewise, ready to tear the strip of paper which fastened its edges.
“Y-es, I suppose so. It may lead to the explanation of this riddle,” he assented.
As the little girl had said, there was nothing whatever in the tin box except a quantity of violets, with some of the wild blossoms that brighten the mesas in spring-time, and one tiny scrap of paper, on which was written, in evident haste
“Dear Brother Joe: Let these violets tell you all that I would say; and, as you are good to our little one, may God be good to you.
“Helen.”
“Well, there’s no great injury done anybody by that deed, I think. We’ll put the note back in the box and the flowers in water. When the mislaid Joseph arrives we’ll restore him his property in the best shape we can,” said Mr. Smith.
Peter listened, surprised. His master was almost mirthful, and that, too, even during an attack of his dreaded malady. If this were the effect of Josephine’s presence, he hoped that she would remain; though he was shrewd enough to comprehend, from Mr. Smith’s words, that this was doubtful.
“The worst I hopes about it is that that other out-of-the-way Joe Smith turns out a wuthless creetur’ that Massa Joe won’t be trustin’ little missy with. I ain’t a-wishin’ nobody no harm, I ain’t, but I’se powerful willin’ the mislaid uncle stays lost forever. Yes, suh,” he assured his fellow-servants.
The violets were in a cut-glass bowl which Peter received no reprimand for bringing, though it was the choicest piece in his master’s possession, but, as the old man reasoned: “The fittenest one for posies what had travelled in a little gell’s trunk, all the way from Californy.” The gouty foot had ceased to torment its owner; the street without was utterly quiet; the fire glowed in the grate, and its glow was reflected in a lonely old man’s heart as on the happy face of a little girl who nestled beside him. He remembered her statement that she could sing, but he had been musical in his own day and shrank from discord. Could a child so young make real melody? He doubted it, yet it was now his intention to make her as happy as it lay in his power to do, for the brief while that he might keep her; and he recalled her mother’s written words: