FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   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   171   >>   >|  
a tone of disappointment, "then she could not have been very pretty." "I dare say she was, but I do not know," returned Leam. "And she died?" continued Fina, yawning in a childishly indifferent manner. "Yes, she died." "Why? Who killed her? Did papa?" asked Fina. Leam's face was very white: "No, not papa." "Did God?" "I cannot tell you, Fina," said Leam, to whom falsehoods were abhorrent and the truth impossible. "Did you?" persisted Fina with childish obstinacy. "Now go," said Leam, putting her off her lap and rising from her chair in strange disorder. "You are troublesome and ask too many questions." Fina began to cry loudly, and Mr. Dundas, from his library below, heard her. He came up stairs with his fussy, restless kindness, and opened the door of the room where his two daughters, of nature and by adoption, were. "Heyday! what's all this about?" he cried. "What's the matter, my little Fina? what are you crying for? Tut, tut! you should not cry like this, darling; and, Leam," severely, "you should really keep the child better amused and happy. She is as good as gold with me: with you there is always something wrong." Fina ran into his arms sobbing. "Leam is cross," she said. "She will not tell me who killed mamma." The man's ruddy face, reddened and roughened with travel, grew white and pitiful. "God took her away, my darling," he said with a sob. "She was too good for me, and He took her to live with the angels in heaven," "And Leam's mamma? Is she in heaven too with the angels?" asked Fina, opening her eyes wide through their tears, "I hope so," Sebastian answered in an altered voice. Leam covered her face in her hands; then lifting it up, she said imploringly, "Papa, do not talk to her of mamma. It is sacrilege." "I agree with you, Leam," said Mr, Dundas in a steady voice. "We meet at the same point, but perhaps by different methods." [TO BE CONTINUED.] LETTERS FROM SOUTH AFRICA BY LADY BARKER. CAPE TOWN, October 16, 1875. Safe, safe at last, after twenty-four days of nothing but sea and sky, of white-crested waves--which made no secret of their intention of coming on board whenever they could or of tossing the good ship Edinburgh Castle hither and thither like a child's plaything--and of more deceitful sluggish rolling billows, looking tolerably calm to the unseafaring eye, but containing a vast amount of heaving power
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   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   171   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
darling
 

Dundas

 

killed

 

angels

 

heaven

 
CONTINUED
 
methods
 

Sebastian

 
answered
 

altered


opening

 

LETTERS

 
covered
 

sacrilege

 
imploringly
 

lifting

 
steady
 
twenty
 

Castle

 

Edinburgh


thither

 

plaything

 

tossing

 

deceitful

 

sluggish

 

amount

 

heaving

 

unseafaring

 

billows

 

rolling


tolerably

 
coming
 

intention

 

October

 

AFRICA

 
BARKER
 

secret

 
crested
 

rising

 
strange

putting
 

persisted

 
childish
 
obstinacy
 

disorder

 

library

 
loudly
 

troublesome

 
questions
 

impossible