Poor Willie! He was there in the bed, looking curiously at the four women, none of whom seemed quite willing to own him, save Anna. Her heart took him in at once. He had been given to her. She would be faithful to the trust, and folding him in her arms, she cried softly over him, kissing his little face and calling him her darling.
“Anna, how can you fondle such as he?” Eudora asked, rather sharply, for her nature was the hardest, coldest of them all, and rebelled against the innocent boy.
“He is our brother’s child. Our blood is in his veins, and that is why we all must love him. Mother, you will not turn from your grandson,” and Anna held the boy toward her mother, who did not refuse to take him.
Asenath always went with her mother, and at once showed signs of relenting by laying her hand on Willie’s head and calling him “poor boy.” Eudora held out longer, but Anna knew she would yield in time, and satisfied with Willie’s reception so far, went on to speak of Adah. Where was she, did they suppose, and what were the best means of finding her.
At this Mrs. Richards demurred, as did Asenath with her.
“Adah was gone, and they had better let her go quietly. She was nothing to them, and if they took Willie, it was all that could be required of them. Had Adah been John’s wife, it would of course be different, but she was not, and his marriage with ’Lina must not now be prevented. Neither must any one save themselves and John ever know who Willie was. It was not necessary to bruit their affairs abroad. It was very wicked and bad in John, of course, but other young men were as bad.”
This was Mrs. Richards’ reasoning, but Anna’s was different.
“John had distinctly said, ‘I married Lily, and she died.’ Adah was mistaken about the marriage being unlawful. It was a falsehood he told her. She was his wife, and he must not be permitted to commit bigamy, He loved Lily far better than he did ’Lina. He would move heaven and earth to find her, did he know that she was living. And he should know of it. She was going to Kentucky herself to tell him. She would not trust to the telegraph, and should start that very night. There would be no scene. She would only tell John in private. They need not try to dissuade her, for she should go.”
This was what Anna said, and all in vain were her mother’s entreaties to let matters take their course. Anna only replied by going deliberately on with the preparations for her sudden journey, pausing now and then to dream a moment over her own new happiness, taking the letter from her bosom and whispering, “Dear Charlie,” and then as Willie cried for his mother, she essayed to quiet him, hugging him in her arms and mingling her own tears with his. The servants were told that Mrs. Hastings had run away, Eudora, the informer, hinting of insanity, and so this accounted for the sudden interest manifested for Willie by the other ladies, who had him in at their breakfast, and kept him with them in the parlor in spite of Pamelia’s endeavors to coax him away. This accounted, too, for Anna’s journey. She was going to find Adah, and blessing her for this kindness to one whom they had liked so much, Dixson and Pamelia helped to get her ready, both promising the best of care to Willie in her absence, both asking where she was going first, and both receiving the same answer, “To Albany.”
Mrs. Richards was too much stunned clearly to comprehend what had happened or what would be the result; and in a kind of apathetic maze she bade Anna good-bye, and then went back to where Willie sat upon the sofa examining and occasionally tearing the costly book of foreign prints which had been given him to keep him still and make him cease his piteous wail for “mam-ma.” It seemed like a dream to the three ladies sitting at home that night and talking about Anna; wondering that a person of her weak nerves and feeble health should suddenly become so active, so energetic, so decided, and of her own accord start off on a long journey alone and unprotected.