Dr. Parke Alden has taken no more notice of me than if I were a Juney-bug.
I wonder if Miss Katherine will ever marry. She wasn't meant to live in an Orphan Asylum. She was meant to be the Lady of the House, and to wear beautiful clothes, and have horses and carriages and children of her own, and to give orders. Instead of that, she is here; but sometimes she has a look on her face which I call "Waiting." Last week I wrote a poem about it. This is it:
"In the winter, by the fireside, when the snow falls soft and white,
I am waiting, hoping, longing, but for what I don't know quite.
And when summer's sunshine shimmers, and the birds sing clear and sweet,
I am waiting, always waiting, for the joy I hope to meet.
It will be, I think, my husband, and the home he'll make for me;
But of his coming or home-making, I as yet no signs do see.
But I still shall keep on waiting, for I know it's true as fate,
When you really, truly hustle, things will come if just you'll wait."
I don't think much of that. It sounds like "Dearest Willie, thou hast left us, and thy loss we deeply feel." But I wasn't meant for a poet any more than Miss Katherine for an old maid.
Dr. Parke Alden must be dead. Either that or he's no gentleman, or he didn't get my letter. I wish I hadn't written it. I wish I hadn't let him know I was living. But it was Miss Katherine I was thinking about. Thank Heaven, I didn't mention her name! He isn't worth thinking about, and I think of nothing else.
XIII
HIS COMING
