United States or Timor-Leste ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He crossed the room to where his uncle sat and handed him the telegram. "Please read it aloud," he said. "It it concerns all of us." The older doctor complied with the request. Arrive Dunbury January 18 nine forty A.M. So ran the brief though pregnant message. It was signed Captain Geoffrey Annersley. The color went out of Ruth's face as she heard the name.
If Carlotta wants happiness with me I am afraid she will have to come to Dunbury." "You won't reconsider?" "There is nothing to reconsider. There never was any question. I am sorry you even raised one in Dad's mind. You shouldn't have gone to him in the first place. You should have come to me. It was for me to settle." "Highty, tighty!" fumed the exasperated magnate.
Phil looked down at the girl. "I think your question is answered. I can't leave Dunbury," he said. "Then Carlotta ought to come to you." "There are no oughts in Carlotta's bright lexicon. I don't blame her, Tony. Dunbury is a dead hole from most points of view. I am afraid she wouldn't be happy here. You wouldn't be yourself forever. Bet you are planning to get away right now."
"Oh, hang your silly pride, Phil Lambert! Carlotta wants to marry you I tell you though she would murder me if she knew I did tell you." "Maybe she does. But she doesn't want to live in Dunbury. I've good reason to know that. We thrashed it out rather thoroughly on the top of Mount Tom last June. She hasn't changed her mind." Tony sighed. She was afraid Phil was right.
By this time a distant puff of smoke gave evidence that the Boston train was already on its way, leaving Harrison Cressy in Dunbury. Not that he cared. He had business still to transact ere he departed, a new battle to fight. He walked with the firm elastic step of a youth back to town. What did it matter if you were sixty-nine when the best things of life were still ahead of you?
And then the kickers put up a howl that he had a swelled head, felt above the rest of Dunbury because he had a college education and his father was getting to be one of the most prosperous men in town. They complained he wouldn't go in for things the rest of the town was interested in, kept to himself when he was out of the store. There were some grounds for the kick I will admit.
I have to give you the best of me, not the worst of me. And the best of me belongs in Dunbury. I wish I could make you understand. And I wish with all my heart that, since I can't come to you, you could care enough to come to me. But I am not going to ask it not now anyway. I haven't the right. Perhaps in two years time, if you are still free, I shall; but not now. It wouldn't be fair."
"Is that what you thought when you came to Dunbury?" she asked gravely. "No. It is what I have learned to think since I have been in Dunbury." "But you you wouldn't want me to live here?" probed Carlotta. "My child, I would rather you would live here than any place in the whole world. I've traveled a million miles since I saw you last, been back in the past with your mother.
So did Carlotta. I understand better now. I've been back in the past this afternoon, remembering what it means to live in the country and love and mate there in the good old-fashioned way as Carlotta's mother and I did. It is what I want her to do with you. Do you get that, boy? I want her to come to Dunbury. I want her to have a piece of your mother.
"Unfortunately Phil didn't at all care for the exhibit because it happened that I had fallen in love with a man instead of a puppet. I could have told you coming to Dunbury was no earthly use if you had consulted me. Phil did not take to your plan, did he?" "He did not." "And he told you he didn't care for me any more?" Carlotta's voice was suddenly a little low. "He did not.
Word Of The Day