But I didn't go in right away. I couldn't. Inside of me everything was thumping: "Mary Alden, your Mother; Mary Alden, your Mother; Mary Alden, your Mother." There was no other thought but that.

Presently I turned and went down to King Street, to where the Reagans live, and in the dark I stood there and shook my fist at my dead grandfather. I hated him for treating my mother so. Hated him! Then I burst out crying, and cried so awful my eyes were nearly washed out.

There were twelve and a half years' worth of tears that had to come out, and I let them come. After they were out I felt lighter.

But sleep? There wasn't a blink of it for me all night. I was so mixed up with new feelings that I was sick in my stomach, and my old conscience got so sanctimonious that if I could have spanked it I would.

I wasn't eavesdropping; I know that's nasty. But forty times I'd been punished for speaking when I shouldn't, and, besides, it was my duty to find myself. They saw me, and then forgot. If they hadn't wanted me to know what they were saying, they shouldn't have said it.

But that didn't do my conscience any good. I hate a conscience. It's always making you feel low down and disreputable. I don't believe I will say anything to my children about one, and let them have some peace.

For two days I didn't have any. Then I decided I'd wait until Miss Katherine came, and not say anything to her or to anybody about what I'd heard until I found out a little more about that remembrance in her face. But the waiting for her is the longest wait I've ever waited through yet.

It certainly is queer what a surprise you are to yourself. Before I knew that my mother and her father and his father and some other fathers behind him had lived in the Alden House, I would have given all I own, which isn't much, just my body, to have known it. And I guess I would have been that airy Martha couldn't have lived with me, and would have had to take Mary to the pump to bring her senses back with water. Mary is my best part, but at times she hasn't half the common sense she needs, and frequently has a pride Martha has to attend to.

But after I found out I had the same kind of blood in me that Mrs.

General Rodman had in her, though I'm thankful it isn't mentioned on the family's tombstones, it didn't seem half as big a thing as I thought.

I was ashamed of the way it had acted, and of the way it had treated my father. He was too much of a gentleman to talk about his, whether high or low, and I know nothing about him. But I adore his memory! I am his child as well as Mary Alden's, and that's a thing my children are never going to forget. Never.

And now the part I'm thinking of most is what was said about Miss Katherine and Dr. Parke Alden being sweethearts when they were young. He has been away thirteen years, Mrs. Moon said, and Miss Katherine is now twenty-eight. I know she is, because she told me so.

Thirteen from twenty-eight leaves fifteen, so she was fifteen when they had that fuss and he went off. Fifteen was awful young to love hard and permanent; but Miss Webb says Miss Katherine was born grown and stubborn, and when she once takes a stand she keeps it.

I wonder what she took the stand with Uncle Parke for? She is right quick and outspoken at times, and I bet he made her mad about something.

But she ought to have known he was a man, and not expected much. I know my children's father is going to make me so hopping at times I could shake him. If he didn't, he would be terrible stupid to live with, and nothing wears you out like stupidness. I don't really mind a sc.r.a.p. It's so nice to make up.

But I believe that's the reason Miss Katherine don't get married.

Because in her secret heart Dr. Parke Alden is still her sweetheart. I know in his secret heart she is still his. She's bound to be if she ever once was.

Glorious superbness! Wouldn't that be grand? If they were to get married she would be my really, truly Aunt! The very thought makes me so full of thrills I can't sit still when it comes over me.

Oh, Mary Martha Cary, what a beautiful place this world could be!

XII

A TRUE MIRACLE

A secret isn't any pleasure. What's the use of knowing a thing you can't let anybody know you know? If I can't tell soon what I've heard about myself something is liable to happen.

Nearly three months have pa.s.sed, and I haven't told yet. I'm still holding out, but it's the most awful experience I ever had.

Another idea has come to me, and if I could see Miss Katherine I could tell whether to do it or not. If she don't come soon I will do it, anyhow. I won't be able to help it.

The girls say if I were a darkey they'd think I was seeking. That's because some days I'm so unnatural quiet and stay so much by myself. I do that for safety, fearing otherwise I'd speak.

They don't know what's going on inside of me. If they could see they'd find nothing but quiverings and questions, and if I don't do anything really violent it's all I ask.

Every morning and every night my prayers are just this: "O Lord, help Mary Cary through this day. I'm not asking for to-morrow, it not being here yet. But _This Day_ help me to hold out." And all day long I'm saying under my breath:

"Hold on, Mary Cary, hold on, hold on.

There never was a night that didn't have a dawn.

There never was a road that didn't have an end.

Wait awhile, wait awhile, and then the letter send."

I say that so often to myself that I'm afraid somebody will hear me think it. If that letter isn't sent soon, the answer will be received by a corpse.

I'm never again going to have a secret. It's worse than a tumor or dropsy. Mrs. Penick has a tumor. I've never seen the dropsy, but a secret is more dangerous, for it dries you up. Dropsy has water to it.

We had apple-dumplings for dinner. I sold mine to Lucy Pyle for two cents, and bought a stamp with it. The stamp is for The Letter.

Miss Katherine has come back. Came night before last, but I've been too excited to write anything down. Everything I do is done in dabs these days, and few lines at the time is all I'm equal to.

She looks grand. And oh, what a difference her being here makes! We are children, not just orphans, when she is with us; and it's because she loves us, trusts us, brings our best part to the top that we are different when she is about. The very way she laughs--so clear and hearty--makes you think things aren't so bad, and already they have picked up. Like my primrose does when I give it water, after forgetting it till it is as limp as old Miss Sarah Cone's crepe veil.

I haven't told her anything yet, but I've been watching good. I haven't seen any particular signs of memories and regrets, she being too busy to have them since she got back. Still, I believe they are there, and I'm that afraid I'll say Parke Alden in my sleep I put the covering over my head, for fear she'd hear me if I did.

I am back in her room, and this afternoon she asked me what I was looking at her so hard for. I told her she was the best thing to look at that came my way, and she laughed and called me a foolish child. But Mary Cary is thinking, and she isn't telling all she thinks about, either.

Well, it's written. That letter is written and gone. It was to Dr. Parke Alden. I sent it to his hospital in Michigan. I made it short, because by nature I write just endless, having gotten in the habit from making up stories for the girls and scribbling them off when kept in, which in the past was frequent. This is what I wrote:

DR. PARKE ALDEN:

_Dear Sir_,--Eleven weeks and two days ago I heard you did not know I was living. I am. I live in the Yorkburg Female Orphan Asylum, and have been living here for nine years and four months and almost a week. If you had known I was living all these years and had not made yourself acquainted with me, I would not now write you. But I heard, by accident, you did not know I had been born, so I am writing to tell you I was. It happened in Natchez, Miss. I know that much, but little more, except my father was an actor. I worship his memory. My mother was named Mary Alden, and you are her brother. If you would like to know more, and will write and ask me, I think you will learn something of interest. Not about me, but there are other people in this world.

Respectfully,

MARY CARY.

Three days have pa.s.sed since I sent that letter off secret. I wouldn't let Miss Katherine know for a billion dollars that I'd sent it, but I'm glad I did. I'm sure she's got something in her heart she don't talk about, for last night, when she didn't know I was looking, I saw that same quiet proudness come in her face I saw the night of the ball.

I don't know how long it takes to go to Michigan, not knowing much about travelling, as I've never been out of Yorkburg since I came in. But some day I'm going around the world, and I'm going to see everything anybody else has ever seen before I marry my children's father. Of course, after I get married he will be busy, and there will be always some excuse that will make you tired. I'm going beforehand. Miss Webb says marriage is very uncertain.

This is a grand day. The crocuses are peeping up just as pert and pretty. The little brown buds on the trees have turned green and getting bigger every day, and even the air feels like it's had a bath. I just love the spring. Everything says to you: "Good-morning! Here we are again. Let's begin all over." And inside I say, "All right," and I mean it; but oh, Mary Cary, you're so unreliable. There are times when your future looks very much like a worm of the dust.

Miss Bray is real sick. She hasn't been well for a long time, and she looks like she's shrivelling, though still fat. She has nervous dyspepsia, which they say is ruinous to dispositions, and Miss Bray's isn't the kind for any sort of sickness to be free with.

It certainly is making her queer, for she's changed from sharpness to tearfulness, and she weeps any time. A thing I never thought I'd live to see.

Poor creature, I feel real sorry for her. Miss Jones says she's worn out, but I don't believe it's that. I believe it's conscience and coffee. Miss Bray isn't an all-over bad person. If it wasn't I knew she told stories, I could have stood the other things. But when a person tells stories, what have you got to hold on to? Nothing.

I believe it's those stories that's giving her trouble in her stomach.

Anything on your mind does, and Miss Bray looks at me so curious and so nervous, sometimes, that I can't help feeling sorry for her.