That's what I did with what was making me doleful, and now I'm all right again. It was because I did want to go to Europe awful, and it twisted my heart like a machine had it when I turned my back on the chance. And then, too, it was because the girls begged me so not to go away for good that I got so worried.
They said it wouldn't be the same if I wasn't here, and though they didn't blame me, they begged me so not to go that I got as addled as the old black hen that hatched ducks.
Now, did you ever hear of such a thing? As if it really mattered where Mary Cary lived! I didn't know anybody truly cared, and finding out made me light in the head. But I know that's just passing—their caring, I mean. I'm much obliged; but they'll forget it in a little while, and I will be just a memory.
I hope it will be bright. There's so much dark you can't help that a brightness is real enjoyable. They say what you look for you see, and what you want to forget you mustn't remember. There are a lot of things about my Orphan life I'm going to try to forget. But there are some that for the sake of sense, and in case of airs, I had better bear in mind. I guess Martha will see to those. Whenever Mary gives signs of soaring, Martha brings her straight back to earth. Martha doesn't care for soarers, and she has a terrible bad habit of letting them know she don't.
Yorkburg hasn't settled down yet, and is still hanging on to the last remnants of the surprise about Uncle Parke's coming, and about his marriage to Miss Katherine and my going away.
Of course, Miss Amelia Cokeland wanted to know if he'd made the Asylum a present, and how much. At first nobody would tell her. She's got such a ripping curiosity that there isn't a sneeze sneezed in Yorkburg, or a cake baked, or a door shut that she doesn't want to know why. But maybe she can't help it. Some people are natural inquirers, and that's the way she makes her living, telling the news.
She used to work buttonholes, but since she can't see good she just spends the day out and tells all she hears. Nobody really likes her, but her tongue is too sharp to fool with. To keep from being talked about, everybody pretends to be friendly.
I don't. She shook her finger at me once because I wouldn't tell her what was in Miss Katherine's letter the first time she went away, and since then she's never noticed me until Uncle Parke came. Now every time I see her she's awful pleasant, and tries to make me talk. But a finger once shook is shook. I don't talk.
But Uncle Parke did make the Asylum a present. He didn't tell me, neither did Miss Katherine, and I don't think he wanted anybody but the Board ladies to know. But, of course, they couldn't keep it secret. They told their husbands, and that meant the town. Nothing but a dead man could keep from talking about money.
It must have been a lot he gave, for Peelie Duke told me she heard Mrs. Carr and Mrs. Dent talking about it the day she took some apple-jelly for Miss Jones over to little Jessie Carr, who was sick.