“I’ll not, reverend sir, as soon as we catch up a little; and anyway it is so hard to find anybody. My woman does the washing well, but I tried her on the ironing and it was hopeless! The children have so many starched things, too, this hot weather, and they have to look well in school.”
“All the more reason, then, for having some help.”
“School is almost out and then Hilary and June will be able to help me more.”
Dr. Lancaster sighed and went back to his study, where much work of a different sort was waiting him. In a few minutes, Mrs. Lancaster with her open letter slipped to the study door, peeped in to see if her husband were writing and under the influence of the divine afflatus; but finding that he was still reading the morning paper, she went in to share the news of her rather amazing message.
“Read this, dear, and tell me if I am dreaming.”
Dr. Lancaster looked inquiringly at his wife, laid down the paper, took the letter and began to read it aloud.
My dear Grace:
It is at least three weeks, I know, since I wrote. But you can imagine how much there was to do and how sad it all was. I will write about it in detail later, but I have a special purpose in this letter.
Although Horace was Mother Garland’s only child and although she and I have lived together for so long, still it never occurred to me that she would leave the bulk of the property to me. That was one surprise, and another was that there is so much of it. Mother lived so simply and we never knew until after her death how many people and causes she had helped. She wrote me a beautiful letter, found with her will and other papers, and told me to accept it all with her love and to take the rest and travel I would need. Her home is to go to an old friend, so that relieves me of much care here, and I shall make headquarters at my own lovely place, as soon as my tenant’s lease expires. For the summer I shall go to the lake as usual, and may have a new cottage built.
Now for the important plan I have to suggest. After I returned home from my last delightful visit with you all, it came over me how much all of us, from little Mary to your husband, depended upon our Hilary. Think it over and see if it isn’t so. Hilary is so full of life and vim and is so unusually capable in anything she undertakes that if we are not careful she may use up some of that vital force too early. O, I know we grow by activity and all that,—but what would you think of a change for Hilary from home and high school to a girls’ school, for her last two years before college? I gathered from what you and Max said that you are planning to send her to college; and even then I was hoping to have a share in that. And now, if you are willing, I can do much more for my little namesake.