But she might then lapse into a morose and unfortunate state of mind, unless she could rest, have a surcease of worry, and a change of scene. How could poor Mrs. Eland leave her position to care for her sister? And how could either of them go away for a year or two to rest, with their small means?
It was, indeed, a very unfortunate condition of affairs. That the hospital matron knew nothing as yet about the fortune which should be her own and her sister’s, made it no better in Ruth’s opinion.
The more volatile Agnes could not be expected to feel so deeply the misfortune that had overtaken them. Besides, Agnes had one certain reason for being put in a happier frame of mind by the discovery they had just made.
The cloud of suspicion that had been raised in her thoughts by circumstantial evidence, no longer rested upon Neale O’Neil. If Neale would only “get over his mad fit,” as Agnes expressed it, she thought she would be quite happy once more.
For never having possessed a hundred thousand dollars in fact, Agnes Kenway was not likely to weep much over its loss. The vast sum of money had really been nothing tangible to her.
Only for an hour or so after Ruth had been to the bank the second time and made sure that the money in the old album was legal tender, had Agnes really been convinced of its value. Then her thought had flown immediately to the possibility of their buying the long-wished-for automobile.
But the tempting possibility had no more than risen above the horizon of her mind than it had been eclipsed by the horrid discovery that a robber had relieved them of the treasure trove.
“So, that’s all there is to that!” sighed Agnes to herself. “I guess the Corner House family won’t ride in a car yet awhile.”
When Ruth had spoken about Mrs. Eland and her sister, however, saying that the money really belonged to them, this thought finally gained a place in Agnes’ mind, too. She was not at all a selfish girl, and she began to think that perhaps an automobile would not have been forthcoming after all.
“Goodness! what a little beast I am,” she told herself in secret. “To think only of our own pleasure. Maybe, if the money hadn’t been lost, Mrs. Eland would have given us enough out of it to buy the car. But just see what good could have come to poor Miss Pepperill and Mrs. Eland if the money had reached their hands.