“I will hurry on,” she said, when they came in sight of the cabin. “You capture Brevet, Harry, and make him understand that he will be reduced to the ranks if he says one word down here of what has happened up at Homespun—your mother must be the first to know.”
“You have set me a rather difficult task,” laughed Harry; but he saw the wisdom of it, and bearing down upon Brevet he detained him an unwilling little prisoner until he had extracted—but slowly and painfully it must be confessed—the required promise. Courage found the little cabin full; that is, Mary Duff, Sylvia and the children all were there as she expected, but a word to Mammy, to whom Courage’s slightest wish was law, and the little cabin was cleared in a twinkling, all hands finding themselves peremptorily shooed like a pack of geese to the pond below, under some foolish pretext or other.
“Has the letter come?” Joe asked, breathlessly. “Any news in it?”
“Yes, I have a letter,” and Courage drew a rocking-chair close to the bed; “but there is nothing new in it, only it suggests something to me. It speaks of some treasures of Sylvia’s that might throw a little light on the subject. I remember now that Sylvia once showed them to me, and I do not see why I have been so stupid as not to think of them before. They were a string of coral beads, a gay belt of some sort, and a little devotional book.”
“Anythin’ written in de book?” interrupted Joe, his clasped hands trembling with excitement.
“Nothing much, Joe. We mustn’t grow too hopeful quite yet, but I am quite sure it was some name such as would belong to a gentleman’s country-place, and I think I should recall it if I heard it. Now, doesn’t Mammy sometimes speak of the plantation where she used to live, by some name or other?”
“Sunnyside,” panted Joe, “Sunnyside; it’s on her lips eb’ry day or two. Do you t’ink—do you t’ink dat’s it?”
“Oh, I don’t dare to think, Joe, it would be so easy for me to be mistaken——”
“Call Mammy then, call Sylvy,” Joe cried, excitedly, “call dem quick!”
“Yes, I will call them right away, but, Joe, we must all try to be calm” (for she feared the effect of so much excitement). “You must be calm for your own sake, Joe, and for theirs, and if we should chance to be on the verge of a happy discovery, we must not spring it too suddenly upon them. Let me talk to them a little before you ask Sylvia about the name.”