CHAPTER X.
AT REST NOW.
WONDER why Edgar North does not write to me. I can’t think what can have happened to him. Just think, auntie; I know that when his last letter came, the leaves had not all gone from the trees, and now look at the snow.”
Several months had passed away since Arthur and his aunt had come home, and the winter chill and shadows were gathering around. Many letters had found their way to Myrtle Hill from the far-away mother in India, and sometimes, though not so often, answers went back to tell her things about her child that made her glad.
At first Arthur had often had tidings of his absent friend, beginning, “My dear Arthur, I hope you are quite well;” and there was a sadness that spoke in his short notes that Arthur could scarcely understand. But in one of his letters Edgar had said, “I have to be indoors by myself a great deal, and then I think of the things we used to talk about”. That was the last letter that had come from him, and now it was several months ago, and Arthur was wondering at the long silence, as he had written twice in answer to this letter. But many things had taken up his thoughts and his time, and the winter holidays had begun, before he had thought much of his absent friend.
“Aunt Daisy,” said Arthur one morning, about two days after he had seen his lesson books put away for the present, “I really wish I knew what has become of Edgar; I think it is the strangest thing that he never writes to me. People do not generally stop caring about their friends suddenly, do they?”
“No, dear, not generally. Perhaps little boys may be peculiar kinds of creatures, you know,” she said, smiling.
“I am sure, aunt,” said Arthur, looking aggrieved, “you think boys are much nicer than you did once. And, besides, Edgar and I are not little.”
“No, dear,” said his aunt, laughing and kissing him. “I do think they are very nice sometimes; and you are getting a great big fellow, whatever Edgar is.”