FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>  
name could have been chosen. It was mercy that saved her life, mercy that preserved her during all the years we were apart, mercy that brought about our marvellous meeting, and it is mercy that has given her back to me at last." CHAPTER XIX The Prize Giving All the school was delighted at Mercy's good fortune, but no one more so than Sylvia. To feel that Dr. Severn's discovery was indirectly due to herself was an unbounded satisfaction. "I always wanted so much to discover Mercy's friends," she said to Linda. "And isn't it strange that when I believed I'd found her mother it was just a silly mistake, and when I'd really found her father, I didn't suspect it in the least. I never dreamt of Dr. Severn being a relation, even when I saw his locket was the same as Mercy's. You see, Mercy said it was a Chinese charm, so I thought perhaps they were quite common, like the blue-bead tassel he'd been showing you, and anybody who'd been in China might have one. Suppose I hadn't come to stay with you at Whitsuntide, or we hadn't gone to tea that afternoon, you wouldn't have noticed that locket, because Mercy hadn't shown hers to you; and if you'd told Dr. Severn about her being found, he'd never have guessed it was his own Mary. I don't think anything you could have offered me in the whole world would have made me gladder than this!" There was only one flaw in Sylvia's happiness. Mercy, who was now seventeen, was to leave Heathercliffe House to be mistress of Dale Side. Both Miss Kaye and Dr. Severn thought her right place was with her father, and that her schooldays might fitly come to a close. "I couldn't part from her again," said the doctor, "not even to send her to so short a distance as Aberglyn. We've still to learn to know each other, and the more we're in each other's company the better. I can arrange for visiting masters to give her lessons in painting and music, but she's such a tall girl, I feel she's almost a woman, and will soon begin to take care of me, instead of allowing me to take care of her." To Sylvia, Mercy's absence would leave a great blank, but she was consoled when Dr. Severn promised that she should be their first visitor, and that he would ask her mother to allow her to spend part of the August holidays with them at Craigwen, where Linda and her brothers would be able to join them constantly for walks and excursions. There was little more of the summer term left for anyone at He
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>  



Top keywords:
Severn
 

Sylvia

 

mother

 

thought

 

locket

 
father
 
Aberglyn
 

arrange

 
distance
 

doctor


company

 

couldn

 
mistress
 

Heathercliffe

 
happiness
 

seventeen

 
visiting
 
preserved
 

schooldays

 

lessons


Craigwen

 

brothers

 

holidays

 

August

 

visitor

 

summer

 

constantly

 

excursions

 

painting

 

consoled


promised

 
absence
 

chosen

 

allowing

 

masters

 
dreamt
 

suspect

 
mistake
 

Giving

 
CHAPTER

relation
 

Chinese

 
wanted
 
discover
 

discovery

 

satisfaction

 
unbounded
 

friends

 
delighted
 

school