Within a few weeks came a letter from Mrs. Rowan to Edith. It is not natural for people to write in their own way—that comes with education and practice; but this letter breathed the writer's very self. It radiated a timid distress. She had surprising news to tell. Instead of being in a tenement of her own, among plain people whom she would feel at ease with, she was installed as housekeeper in what seemed to her a very magnificent establishment. Mr. Williams, her employer, was an importing merchant, and his family consisted of a daughter, eighteen years of age, and an awful sister-in-law who lived in the next street, but visited his house at all hours of day or evening, superintending minutely his domestic arrangements. This gentleman knew Major Cleaveland well, and had for many years had business relations with Captain Cary. Indeed, it was their sailor friend who had procured the situation for her, and insisted on her taking it. She had refused as long as she could, but Dick himself joining against her, she had finally yielded. Mr. Williams was very kind. He had assured her that he did not want a city housekeeper, but some quiet, honest countrywoman to be in the house with his daughter, and see that the servants did not rob him.
At the conclusion of this letter, Mrs. Rowan added that Dick sent his respects, at which Edith's heart sank with disappointment. Where was the hearty affection, the eager remembrance she had looked for?
The child would have been less indignant had she known what pains Dick was really taking for her sake. He had searched out, and borrowed or bought all the printed correspondence of famous letter-writers that were to be had for love or money, and was studying them as models. He had also invested extravagantly in stationery, and was striving to bend his clear, clerkly penmanship to something more elegant and gentlemanlike. Even while she was accusing him of forgetfulness, he was carefully copying his tenth letter to her.
But still, Edith was not to blame, though she was mistaken. Affection has no right to be silent.
After a few days, however, came his farewell before sailing for the East. Over this note, Edith shed bitter tears, as much for the manner as for the matter of it. For Dick, with an eye to Mrs. Yorke as a reader, had composed a very dignified epistle after the manner of Doctor Johnson. Poor Dick! who could have written the most eloquent letter in the world, if he had poured his heart out freely and simply.
The child had scant time allowed her for mourning, for her studies began immediately. The family were all her teachers, and she began at once with music and languages. The common branches were taught indirectly. Geography she learned by looking out on the maps places mentioned in their reading or conversation. History she learned chiefly through biography. For arithmetic, some one gave her every day a problem to solve. She added up household expenses, measured land, laid out garden-beds, weighed and measured for cooking. Her study was all living: not a dead fact got into her mind. She read a great deal besides, travels, all that she could find relating to the sea, and poetry. As her mind became interested, she settled once more into harmony with herself, and her feelings grew quiet. The impression left by Dick's strange behavior after their parting faded away, and she remembered only his last fervent protestation: "I'll climb, Edith, I'll climb!" How it was to be, and what it really meant, she knew not; but the old faith in him came back. "What Dick said he'd do, he always did."
She associated him with all she read or heard of foreign lands and waters. He had sailed through phosphorescent seas by night, under wide-eyed stars, while the waves tossed in fire from his prow, and trailed in fire in his wake. He had lain in the warm southern ocean, where the tides are born, had held his breath during that pause when all the waters of the earth hang balanced, and swung his cap as he felt the first soft pulse of the infant tidal wave that was to grow till its rim should cast a wreath of foam on every shore from the North Pole to the South. Palms and the banyan-tree, pines almost huge enough to tip the earth over, each in turn had shaded his head. His venturesome feet had trod the desert and the jungle. Jews and Moslems had looked after him as he sauntered through their crowded bazaars—the bright-eyed, laughing sailor-boy! Norsemen had smiled as they saw his hair blown back and his face kindled by the tempest. It was always Dick to the fore of everything.
On one of those spring mornings, Carl, wandering through the woods, came out into the road in front of an old school-house that stood at the edge of the village. The door was open, and showed a crowd of children at their studies inside. On the green in front of the door lay a log, and on the log sat a deplorable-looking little man. He was neither young nor old, but seemed to be stranded on some bleak age which time had forgotten. His clothes were gentlemen's clothes cut down and patched. A hat that was too large for him reached from his forehead to his neck. It was not crushed, but it was shabby, and drooped sorrowfully in the brim. His hair was thin and long, and patted down. Tears rolled over his miserable face as he sat and looked in at the children saying their lessons in a long class. He did not cover his face in weeping, but lifted his eyebrows, wiped the tears occasionally, and continued to gaze.
Carl was one of the last persons in the world to intrude on another, or allow any intrusion on himself, but after a moment's hesitation he ventured to approach this pitiful little figure, and ask what ailed him.
The man showed no surprise on being addressed, but poured out his grief at once. His name was Joseph Patten, he was poor and had a large family, and was obliged to receive town help. As a condition of that help, he must give up one of his children to be bound out to work, or adopted into a family. The parents were allowed to choose which child they would part with, and "Joe," as he was called by everybody, was now trying to make up his mind. His story was told in a whimpering voice, and with many tears, and the listener was quite as much provoked to laugh as to weep.