“Well, we might—that is to say—” began Caleb.
“How I should love to be like May, Father, and have my eyes so that I might serve him, might show my love for him, who has been so good, so kind, so dear.”
Poor Caleb! How often he said to himself as he looked at her, in remorse, “Have I deceived her from her cradle, thinking to make her happier, but to break her heart at last?”
XXXVI
CHIRP THE THIRD
John Listens to the Cricket
THE Dutch clock in the corner struck ten, when the carrier sat down at his fireside. So troubled was he that he scarcely heard the cuckoo as it counted off the strokes.
He could scarcely believe what his eyes had seen in the wareroom of Gruff and Tackleton. If any one had told him, he would not have believed his Dot could be a party to such dreadful deceit.
Yet, in his own heart, he did not blame her, but rather the old young man who had been so wickedly unfair, and he was planning to do him harm to pay him back. He hoped that Dot would be able to explain; but no—there really wasn’t any hope of that.