"Did he, really?" cried Gertrude, curiously. "I thought he was never coming back. The last story was that your father had turned him out-of-doors."
"How perfectly absurd! I should think you knew enough about us to contradict that, Gertrude! Will you please tell every one there is no truth in it, at all?"
"But where is he now? Is he here? Why has nobody seen him? Wasn't any of it true?"
"Dear me, Gertrude, you are nothing but a big interrogation point!" laughed Cynthia, who had no intention of replying to any of these questions; and Gertrude, baffled and somewhat ashamed of herself, soon took her departure without having learned anything beyond the fact that Neal had lately been in town and, as she supposed, at his sister's.
Aunt Betsey came from Wayborough as soon as she heard of what happened. It was her first visit there since the death of Silas Green, and naturally she was much affected.
"Cynthy, my dear," she said, after talking about him for some time to her nieces, "let me give you a word of warning: Never put off till to-morrow what can be done to-day! It is a good proverb, and worth remembrance. If I hadn't put off and put off, and been so unwilling to give up my view, I might have made Silas's last years happier. Perhaps he'd have been here yet if I'd been with him to take care of him. Oh, one has to give up—one has to give up in this world!"
They were in Edith's room, and Edith, listening, felt that Aunt Betsey was right. She, too, had learned—many, many years earlier in life than did her aunt—that one must learn to give up.
Miss Betsey did not look the same. The gay dress that she once wore was discarded, and she was soberly clad in black. She really was not unlike other people now, but her speech was as quaint as ever.
She brought Willy's present with her, and was shocked to find that Janet's had never been received.
"Well, now, I want to know!" she exclaimed, rocking violently. "I did it up with my own hands. I remember it exactly, for it was a few days after the funeral, and I was that flustered I could scarcely tie the cord or hold the pen. It was a large rag doll I had made for the child, just about life size, and a face as natural as a baby's. And I made a nice little satchel to hang at the side, and in the satchel was the money. Too bad she didn't get it! I remember I gave it to old Mr. Peters to mail. He was going down Tottenham way, and he said he'd take it to the post-office there. He'd stopped to see if there was anything he could do for me just as I was tying it up, so I let him take it along. He's half blind, and just as likely as not he went to the meeting-house instead of the post-office. He wouldn't know them apart. You may depend upon it, it warn't Government's fault you didn't get it. Of that I'm very sure."