The Late Mrs. Null

by Frank R. Stockton

"That chair wasn't put there for me," said Miss Annie, with a smile.

"Nonsense," said Lawrence. "Won't you please sit down? I ought to have asked you before. Perhaps it is too cool for you, out there."

"Oh, not at all," said she. "The air is still quite warm." And she took her seat on the chair which was placed close to the door-step, and she read to him some of the surprising and interesting facts which Mr Salmon had heard, in a Dublin coffee-house, about Virginia and the other colonies, and also some of those relating to the kindly way in which slave-holders in South America, when they killed a slave to feed their hounds, would send a quarter to a neighbor, expecting some day to receive a similar favor in return. When they had laughed over these, she read some very odd and surprising statements about Southern Europe, and the people of far-away lands; and so she went on, from one thing to another, talking a good deal about what she had read, and always on the point of stopping and giving the book to Lawrence, until the short autumnal afternoon began to draw to its close, and he told her that it was growing too chilly for her to sit out on the grass any longer.

"Very well," said she, closing the book, and handing it to him, "you can read the rest of it yourself, and if you want any other books on the list, just let me know by Uncle Isham, and I will send them to you. He is coming now to see after you. I wonder," she said, stopping for a moment as she turned to leave, "if Miss March had been sitting in that chair, if you would have had the heart to tell her to go away; or if you would have let her sit still, and take cold."

Lawrence smiled, but very slightly. "That subject," said he, "is one on which I don't joke."

"Goodness!" exclaimed Miss Annie, clasping her hands and gazing with an air of comical commiseration at Mr Croft's serious face. "I should think not!" and away she went.

Just before supper time, when Lawrence's door had been closed, and his lamp lighted, there came a knock, and Mrs Keswick appeared. "That plan of mine didn't work," she said, "but I will bring Miss March out here, and manage it so that she'll have to stay till I come back. I have an idea about that. All that you have to do is to be ready when you get your chance."

Lawrence thanked her, and assured her he would be very glad to have a chance, although he hoped, without much ground for it, that Roberta would not see through the old lady's schemes.

Mrs Keswick lotioned and rebandaged the sprained ankle, and then she said. "I think it would be pleasant if we were all to come out here after supper, and have a game of whist. I used to play whist, and shouldn't mind taking a hand. You could have the table drawn up to your chair, and,—let me see—yes, there are three more chairs. It won't be like having her alone with you," she said, with the cordial grin in which she sometimes indulged, "but you will have her opposite to you for an hour, and that will be something."

Lawrence approved heartily of the whist party, and assured Mrs Keswick that she was his guardian angel.