This was the hardest question of all, and Adah’s distress was visible as she replied. “Willie’s father left me, and I don’t know where he is.”
An incredulous, provoking smile flitted over Eudora’s face as she returned, “We hardly care to have a deserted wife in our family—it might be unpleasant.”
“Yes,” and the old lady took up the argument, “Anna is well enough without a maid. I don’t know why she put that foolish advertisement in the paper, in answer, I believe, to one equally foolish which she saw about an unfortunate woman with a child.”
“I am that woman. I wrote that advertisement when my heart was heavier than it is now, and God took care of it. He pointed it out to Miss Anna. He caused her to answer it. He sent me here, and you will let me see her. Think if it were your own daughter, pleading thus with some one.”
“That is impossible. Neither my daughter, nor my daughter-in-law, if I had one, could ever come to a servant’s position,” Mrs. Richards replied, not harshly, for there was something in Adah’s manner which rode down her resentful pride; and she might have yielded, but for Eudora, whose hands had so ached to shake the little child, now innocently picking at a bud.
How she did long to box his ears, and while her mother talked, she had taken a step forward more than once, but stopped as often, held in check by the little face and soft blue eyes turned so trustingly upon her, the pretty lips once actually putting themselves toward her, as if expecting a kiss. Eudora could not harm that child sitting on her embroidery as coolly as if he had a right: but she could prevent her mother from granting the stranger’s request; so when she saw signs of yielding, she said, decidedly, “She cannot see Anna, mother. You know how foolish she is, and there’s no telling what fancy she might take.”
“Eudora,” said Mrs. Richards in a low tone, “it might be well for Anna to have a maid, and this one is certainly different from the others who have applied.”
“But we can’t be bothered with a child. It would drive us crazy.”
“Yes, certainly, I did not think of that. A child would be very troublesome,” Mrs. Richards rejoined.
“So madam, you see how impossible it is for us to keep you, but you can of course stay till car-time, when Jim will carry you back to the depot.”