The Open Door, and the Portrait. - Stories of the Seen and the Unseen. by Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
page 13 of 103 (12%)
page 13 of 103 (12%)
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He gave me a sudden, swift look, investigating my face as though to see
whether, after all, this was everything my eminence as "father" came to,--no more than that. Then he got hold of my shoulder, clutching it with his thin hand. "Look here," he said, with a quiver in his voice; "suppose it wasn't--living at all!" "My dear boy, how then could you have heard it?" I said. He turned away from me with a pettish exclamation,--"As if you didn't know better than that!" "Do you want to tell me it is a ghost?" I said. Roland withdrew his hand; his countenance assumed an aspect of great dignity and gravity; a slight quiver remained about his lips. "Whatever it was--you always said we were not to call names. It was something--in trouble. Oh, father, in terrible trouble!" "But, my boy," I said (I was at my wits' end), "if it was a child that was lost, or any poor human creature--but, Roland, what do you want me to do?" "I should know if I was you," said the child eagerly. "That is what I always said to myself,--Father will know. Oh, papa, papa, to have to face it night after night, in such terrible, terrible trouble, and never to be able to do it any good! I don't want to cry; it's like a baby, I know; but what can I do else? Out there all by itself in the ruin, and nobody to help it! I can't bear it! I can't bear it!" cried my generous boy. And in his weakness he burst out, after many attempts to restrain it, into a great childish fit of sobbing and tears. |
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