FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79  
80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   >>   >|  
up the road for? And just this evening, too, when one would have thought you would we have cared for poor Mother and Alfred,' said she, crying. 'Why, what's the matter now?' said Harold. 'Oh, they've been saying he can't live out the winter,' said Ellen, shedding the tears that had been kept back all this time, and broke out now with double force, in her grief for one brother and vexation with the other. But next winter seemed a great way off to Harold, and he was put out besides, so he did not seem shocked, especially as he was reproached with not feeling what he did not know; so all he did was to say angrily, 'And how was I to know that?' 'Of course you don't know anything, going scampering over the country with the worst lot you can find, away from church and all, not caring for anything! Poor Mother! she never thought one of her lads would come to that!' 'Plenty does so, without never such a fuss,' said Harold. 'Why, what harm is there in eating a few cherries?' There would be very little pleasure or use in knowing what a wrangling went on all the time Mrs. King was up-stairs putting Alfred to bed. Ellen had all the right on her side, but she did not use it wisely; she was very unhappy, and much displeased with Harold, and so she had it all out in a fretful manner that made him more cross and less feeling than was his nature. There was something he did feel, however--and that was his mother's pale, worn, sorrowful face, when she came down-stairs and hushed Ellen, but did not speak to him. They took down the books, read their chapter, and she read prayers very low, and not quite steadily. He would have liked very much to have told her he felt sorry, but he was too proud to do so after having shewn Ellen he was above caring for such nonsense. So they all went to bed, Harold on a little landing at the top of the stairs; but--whether it was from the pounds of merry-stones he had swallowed, or the talk he had had with his sister--he could not go to sleep, and lay tossing and tumbling about, thinking it very odd he had not heeded more what Ellen had said when he first came in, and the notion dawning on him more and more, that day after day would come and make Alfred worse, and that by the time summer came again he should be alone. Who could have said it? Why had not he asked? What could he have been thinking about? It should not be true! A sort of frenzy to speak to some one, and hear the real
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79  
80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Harold

 

Alfred

 

stairs

 

caring

 

feeling

 

thinking

 

winter

 
Mother
 

thought

 

steadily


hushed

 

nature

 

prayers

 

mother

 

chapter

 

sorrowful

 
dawning
 

notion

 

tumbling

 

heeded


summer

 

frenzy

 

tossing

 

nonsense

 

landing

 

pounds

 
sister
 

stones

 

swallowed

 

brother


vexation

 

angrily

 

reproached

 

shocked

 

crying

 

matter

 

evening

 

double

 
shedding
 

wrangling


knowing
 
pleasure
 

eating

 
cherries
 

putting

 
manner
 

fretful

 

displeased

 

wisely

 

unhappy