FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145  
146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   >>   >|  
d ten minutes later, during a hurried dressing, he read the note again, and said, aloud again: "'Have breakfast'! I wonder if she had HERS?" He entered the theatre so late, for all his hurry, that the first act was over and the second well begun, and was barely in his seat before the now familiar opening words of Mabel Vane's part fell clearly on the silence of the darkened house. For a moment Duncan thought, with a great pang of relief, that some one else was filling his stepmother's place; but he recognized her in another minute, in spite of rouge and powder and the piquant dress she wore. His heart stirred with something like pride. She was beautiful in her flowered hat and the caped coat that showed a foam of lacy frills at the throat; and she was sure of herself, he realized in a moment, and of her audience. She made a fresh and appealing figure of the plucky little country bride, and the old lines fell with delicious naturalness from her lips. Duncan's heart hardly beat until the fall of the curtain; tears came to his eyes; and when Margaret shared the applause of the house with the gracious Peg, he found himself shaking with a violent nervous reaction. He was still deeply stirred when he went behind the scenes after the play. His stepmother presently came up from her dressing-room, dressed in street clothes and anxious to hurry to the hospital and have news of the little boy. Duncan called a taxicab, for which she thanked him absently and with worried eyes; and presently, with her and with the child's father, he found himself speeding toward the hospital. It was a silent trip. Margaret kept her ungloved fingers upon Penrose's hand, and said only a cheerful word of encouragement now and then. Duncan waited in the cab, when they went into the big building. She was gone almost half an hour. Darkness came, and a sharp rain began to fall. He was half drowsy when she suddenly ran down the long steps and jumped in beside him. Her face was radiant, in spite of the signs of tears about her eyes. "He took the ether like a little soldier!" she said, as the motor-car slowly wheeled up the wet street. "Mary held his hand all the while. Everything went splendidly, and he came out of it at about four. Mary sang him off to sleep, sitting beside him, and she's still there--he hasn't stirred! Dr. Thorpe is more than well satisfied; he said the little fellow had nerves of iron! And the other doctor isn't even goi
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145  
146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Duncan
 

stirred

 

stepmother

 

moment

 

hospital

 
presently
 
Margaret
 

street

 
dressing
 

building


waited

 

cheerful

 
encouragement
 

drowsy

 
suddenly
 

Darkness

 
hurried
 
Penrose
 

thanked

 

absently


taxicab

 

called

 

worried

 

ungloved

 

fingers

 

silent

 

father

 

speeding

 

Thorpe

 

sitting


doctor

 
satisfied
 

fellow

 

nerves

 

minutes

 
radiant
 

jumped

 
soldier
 

Everything

 
splendidly

slowly
 

wheeled

 
anxious
 
clothes
 

beautiful

 

flowered

 
throat
 

realized

 
opening
 

frills