So after a year he was sent back to me. But the inspector warned me that there would be a lapse. In two months it came. Kelly disappeared. I tore about like a maniac hunting for him everywhere. I don’t believe there was a beer-cellar, a common lodging-house, or a thieves’ kitchen that I didn’t search. He was traced through the scar on his forehead, and I recovered him. But how?
The Kelly who for twelve months had been living a model life among six hundred little abandoned chaps, had plotted with a group of homeless playmates to commit a crime so diabolical and remorseless that at first I refused to believe his brain could have hatched it. By the train between Philadelphia and New York travels every day a crowd of millionaires who come to do their business on the Stock Exchange. The other boys were, through all sorts of tricks, to distract the attention of the signalman while Kelly was to switch on the signals so that another train would come into collision with the train from Philadelphia. After the collision they meant to plunder the dead bodies!
It’s true, Magna; now say, no! you dare not take Kelly under your roof to associate with Oluf. I can’t help it, it was my duty to tell you all. My friend, Judge Rander, in Children’s Court, helped me in every way. He procured for me leave to travel with Kelly out of the country on a verbal and written oath that I would never bring him back. That is why I lived two years, summer and winter, in my White Villa with Kelly and a tutor. I was afraid to let him come near the town, and yet the child needed companions. So at last I ventured to migrate to a town, with the result that Kelly in two years was expelled from three schools. Can you still have the courage, Magna, to let the innocent child, offspring of your heart, become Kelly’s playfellow? And if you are so courageous, how shall I be able to exonerate myself if you come to me one day and say, “Kelly has corrupted my boy”?
I put the words into your mouth, Magna.
Say no, while there is still time. You are strong, stronger than any other woman I know, since you have found yourself again through strenuous exertion and labour. But there are powers that the strongest cannot conquer.
Behind my fears about your saying yes, lies the burning wish that you will, but how shall I ever find words to thank you?
Of course, I realise what it will mean if Kelly from now onwards takes up his abode with you, and directly after his confirmation leaves off school. It’s not what Kelly is to be, but how he becomes what he is, that is going to be for me the main question. I fold my hands in my lap, and I confess my powerlessness.
Make Kelly a man. Make Kelly a good man.
You will understand, Magna, that I could not say all this if we stood face to face. While I have been writing Kelly has been several times to the door. He wants to know what I am doing. Every time I feel tempted to lay down my pen to enjoy his society. He asked me the other day, “Mother, do you believe that people’s fate is pre-ordained?” What could he have meant by it? I dared not ask him. He went on his knees, buried his head in my lap, and cried bitterly.
Magna, don’t keep me long in uncertainty. At least promise me that.