d
have the word slip from his tongue so slick you could see he didn't
even realize that he had used it? The answer would be, if you were
honest, that you wouldn't have liked it any more than she did. She
knew he had to go. She wanted him to be happy. She was as sure of the
man he was going to be as she was sure of the mercy of God. That is
the strongest way I know to tell it. She was unshakably sure of the
mercy of God, but I wasn't. There were times when it seemed as if He
couldn't hear the most powerful prayer you could pray, and when instead
of mercy, you seemed to get the last torment that could be piled on.
Take right now. Laddie was happy, and all of us were, in a way; and in
another we were almost stiff with misery.

I dreaded his leaving us so, I would slip to the hawk oak and cry
myself sick, more than once; whether any of the others were that big
babies I don't know; but anyway, THEY were not his Little Sister. I
was. I always had been. I always would be, for that matter; but there
was going to be a mighty big difference. I had the poor comfort that
I'd done the thing myself. Maybe if it hadn't been for stopping the
Princess when I took him that pie, they never would have made up, and
she might have gone across the sea and stayed there. Maybe she'd go
yet, as mysteriously as she had come, and take him along. Sometimes I
almost wished I hadn't tried to help him; but of course I didn't
really. Then, too, I had sense enough to know that loving each other
as they did, they wouldn't live on that close together for years and
years, and not find a way to make up for themselves, like they had at
the start.

I liked Laddie saying I had made his happiness for him; but I wasn't
such a fool that I didn't know he could have made it for himself just
as well, and no doubt better. So everything was all right with Laddie;
and what happened to us, the day he rode away for the last time, when
he went to stay--what happened to us, then, was our affair. We had to
take it, but every one of us dreaded it, while mother didn't know how
to bear it, and neither did I. Once I said to her: "Mother, when
Laddie goes we'll just have to make it up to each other the best we
can, won't we?"

"Oh my soul, child!" she cried, staring at me so surprised-like. "Why,
how unspeakably selfish I have been! No little lost sheep ever ran
this farm so desolate as you will be without your brother. Forgive me
baby, and come here!"