All this time Sidney Tracy was going through HIS pockets, too, and just as I was getting up again in a hurry he took off his cap and emptied his pockets into it. I wish you could have seen what that cap held then—worms, and sticky chewing-gum, and tops, and strings, and hooks, and marbles, and two pieces of molasses candy all soft and messy, and a little bit of a turtle, and a green toad, and a slice of bread-and-butter, and a dirty, soaking, handkerchief that he and Billy had used for a towel. There was something else there, too—a dark, wet, pulpy, soggy-looking thing with pieces of gum and molasses candy and other things sticking to it. Sidney took it out and held it toward me in a proud, light-hearted way:
“There's your letter, all right,” he said, and Billy gave a whoop of joy and called out, “Good-bye, Alice,” as a hint for me to hurry home. I was so anxious to get the letter that I almost took it, but I stopped in time. I hadn't any gloves on, and it was just too dreadful. If you could have seen it you would never have touched it in the world. I got near enough to look at it, though, and then I saw that the address was so dirty and so covered with gum and bait and candy that all I could read was a capital “M” and a small “s” at the beginning and an “ert” at the end; the name between was hidden. I covered my eyes with my hand and gasped out to the boys that I wanted the things taken off it that didn't belong there, and when I looked again Sidney had scraped off the worst of it and was scrubbing the envelope with his wet handkerchief to make it look cleaner. After that you couldn't tell what ANY letter was, so I just groaned and snatched it from his hands and left those two boys in their disgusting dirt and degradation and went home.
When I got back mamma and Grandma Evarts and Tom Price and Peggy and Aunt Elizabeth were in the parlor, looking more excited than ever, because Maria had been there telling the family about Lorraine. Then she had gone on to Lorraine's and Tom had dropped in to call for her and was waiting to hear about the letter. They were all watching the door when I came in, and Peggy and Aunt Elizabeth started to get up, but sat down again. I stood there hesitating because, of course, I didn't know who to give it to, and Grandma Evarts shot out, “Well, Alice! Well, Well!” as if she was blowing the words at me from a little peashooter. Then I began to explain about the address, but before I could say more than two or three words mamma motioned to me and I gave the letter to her.
You could have heard an autumn leaf fall in that room. Mamma put on her glasses and puzzled over the smear on the envelope, and Peggy drew a long breath and jumped up and walked over to mamma and held out her hand. Mamma didn't hesitate a minute. “Certainly it must be for you, my dear,” she said, and then she added, in a very cold, positive way, “For whom else could it possibly be intended?” No one spoke; but just as Peggy had put her finger under the flap to tear it open, Aunt Elizabeth got up and crossed the room to where mamma and Peggy stood. She spoke very softly and quietly, but she looked queer and excited.
“Wait one moment, my dear,” she said to Peggy. “Very probably the letter IS for you, but it is just possible that it may be for some one else. Wouldn't it be safer—wiser—for ME to open it?”
Then Peggy cried out, “Oh, Aunt Elizabeth, how dreadful! How can you say such a thing!” Mother had hesitated an instant when Aunt Elizabeth spoke, but now she drew Peggy's head down to her dear, comfy shoulder, and Peggy stayed right there and cried as hard as she could—with little gasps and moans as if she felt dreadfully nervous. Then, for once in my life, I saw my mother angry. She looked over Peggy's head at Aunt Elizabeth, and her face was so dreadful it made me shiver.
“Elizabeth,” she said, and she brought her teeth right down hard on the word, “this is the climax of your idiocy. Have you the audacity to claim here, before me, that this letter from my child's affianced husband is addressed to you?”
Aunt Elizabeth looked very pale now, but when she answered she spoke as quietly as before.
“If it is, Ada,” she said, “it is against my wish and my command. But—it may be.” Then her voice changed as if she were really begging for something.
“Let me open it,” she said. “If it is for Peggy I can tell by the first line or two, even if he does not use the name. Surely it will do no harm if I glance at it.”