Chapter III · —THE LETTER.

T he boy walked along, silently thinking over what Elsie had been saying, in a muddly, confused sort of way. Robbie, and granny's letter, and Elsie's beating, lairds and ladies, and something secret and mysterious that Elsie knew, were mingled hazily in his mind, in such chaotic fashion that he had nothing to say, not knowing how to put his ideas into the form of a question.

It was not until they were on their road home again that he suddenly asked, "Whose letter is it, Elsie?"

"What do you mean?" Elsie returned, with more than usual quickness. "I say it's mine and yours. Mother'd say 'twas hers, most likely; perhaps granny might say 'twas hers; I say it's ours as much as ever it's theirs, and the person what wrote it is our father; so there, Duncan."

"Mine too!" Duncan echoed, in greater bewilderment than before. "Then, if it's mine too, Elsie—

"Well, what?"

"I ought to read it, an' see what's in it."

Elsie laughed. "Of course you ought," she replied encouragingly. "That's just what I said to myself when I caught sight of it; and when I'd read it, an' saw that it was all about you and me, an' told a secret too, what granny an' mother have always kept away from us, d'you think I was goin' to give it up? no, not if I know it. An' to think they fancy it's lost—leastways, granny does—an' mother don't know anything about it at all. What fun it is! D'you know, Duncan, I don't so very much like mother."

Duncan looked at her in alarm. Scottish children of all classes are brought up in very strict notions of filial duty and affection, and these were no exceptions to the rule. Duncan looked all round anxiously, as though he feared a bird might carry the dreadful treason to their mother's ears.

Elsie looked as if she were enjoying the sensation she had made. "I've got a good reason," she said, nodding her head knowingly. "You'll see it when you've read the letter. I always thought I wasn't so very fond of her, and now I see why it was. It wouldn't have been right if I had; an' when she beat me, I can't tell you how I felt. I couldn't like any one who beat me!" Elsie continued, grinding her teeth together with rage at the memory, "even if it was my own mother."

"You seemed as if you wanted to make mother do it," said Duncan, who was often much distracted between his allegiance to rebellious Elsie and the strict sense of duty and obedience in which he had always been trained.

"P'raps I did," Elsie replied. "But I don't care; and mother shan't have the chance again. I don't think our father'd let her if he knew it."

"Our father?" faltered Duncan. "Why, our father's dead."

"Is he?" asked Elsie, enigmatically. "Robbie's father is."

"And isn't that ours?" Duncan asked contemptuously.

"That's just it," Elsie replied, with some excitement. "That's just what the letter's about. Now, if you sit down here I'll read it to you."

"We shall be late again," Duncan said, nervously. "Don't let's stop now, Elsie, and make mother cross. Could we do it after school?"

"P'raps I'd better tear it up, or give it back to granny," Elsie said, with a taunting air. "It don't matter to you."

"Oh, don't!" pleaded Duncan, divided again between the sense of duty, his own curiosity, and a fear of offending Elsie. "Do keep it till after school."

"Yes, I will," Elsie replied. "And mind you bring home an atlas with you, for, now I think of it, I must have a map of England and Scotland."

"But we mustn't bring home books," Duncan urged.

"Never mind; you must do it by mistake. We must have a map, I tell you; and if I've had the trouble of getting the letter, you can take the trouble to get the map. Mind you do, now, or else I shan't tell you anything about it. You can take it back in the afternoon. 'Tisn't stealing."

No, nor disobedience, nor deceit, nor telling a lie, eh, Elsie? Evidently Elsie did not stop to think of that any more than she had stopped to consider whether she had any business to read that old letter of her mother's when it fluttered out of the window.

They reached the cottage in good time. Robbie and their grandmother had only just come downstairs. Mrs. MacDougall seemed to be in an unusually pleasant temper this morning. "I'm glad you've hastened, my child," she said to Elsie. "Sit down to the table, and get slicing that cucumber I've just cut. It'll be more refreshing with some bread-and-butter and a cup o' milk than the porridge, and a change too."

Duncan glanced at Elsie with a half shame-faced expression, as much as to say, "Mother is kind, you see, when you're good. She's sorry you had to be beaten last night." But Elsie only replied by a look of defiance, as though to say, "That doesn't make up at all."

"Let's see: what's to-day?" Mrs. MacDougall continued, pleasantly, as she poured out the milk into the children's cups. "Can it be the thirty-first?"

"No, no, Meg; surely not," quavered the old grandmother, who, for reasons of her own, wished to appear ignorant. Was it not to refresh her failing memory about what happened just about this time of year, a long while ago, that she had gone to her daughter's desk, and got out those old faded letters? Mrs. MacDougall would not have minded her reading them, but she would mind having them lost, for she was very methodical; and besides, many of these letters were important ones, written by hands long since folded in death.

"And to-morrow's Robbie's birthday," Mrs. MacDougall continued, laying her rough, strong hand very gently on the child's fair curls. "Very well do I remember this time seven years ago."

"Yes," sighed the old grandmother. "Poor little dears! and Nannie a bonny lass too."

Mrs. MacDougall glanced at her mother with something like a frown. "I never think of Robbie's birthday without thinking about poor Aunt Nannie," she said to the children.

They knew well enough why, for they had heard the tale often enough. Their Aunt Nannie had been their mother's beautiful young sister, and the news of her death had come to them when Robbie was a baby of a week old. They had never even seen her, for Duncan was but a year old, and Elsie not three, when she died, and she had been living in England with her English husband at the time.

"Robbie reminds me so of her," Mrs. MacDougall said softly. "She was fair. He takes after her wonderfully, doesn't he, mother?"

"Very much indeed," the old dame replied.

"Ah well! Robbie must have some fresh cakes to-morrow for his birthday and a plate of plums, and you can have your tea under the big alder an' Elsie shall pour it out."

"Oh, thank you, mother, how nice!" the little boys exclaimed. Elsie's ungracious silence passed unnoticed by all but Duncan.

"P'raps I shan't be here to pour it out," she said, in a careless tone, when they were outside the door. "Mind you don't forget the atlas, Duncan."

Then they started off to school. It was a longish walk across the moor and along a dusty road to the nearest village. Robbie, although seven years old, was exempted from going on account of the distance and his delicacy. Elsie bore in mind that Duncan had gone before he was that age, but Robbie was such a petted baby. He was not nearly so strong as Duncan had been at his age.

Duncan's was a very placid, slow sort of mind. He went through his tasks without any excitement or distraction, although occasionally a vague curiosity as to what Elsie could want the atlas for, and what the letter said about them, did wander through his brain. When school was ended he slipped out unobserved with a small atlas, which he had had difficulty to secure, under his jacket.

Elsie was waiting for him at the edge of the moor. They sat down on some stones, and Elsie pulled the letter from inside the neck of her dress.

"I shan't say anything; I shall read it to you," she began; "and if you can't make anything of it I s'pose I must explain it afterwards. It's from our father to Mrs. MacDougall."

"What, to mother?" Duncan asked.

"H'm, you'll see presently," Elsie said impatiently. "Worst of it is, there's a piece torn off all along, which makes it difficult to read. It begins, 'Dear Mrs. MacDougall.' Oh, I forgot. It's put at the top, 'Kensington, London.' That's the capital of England, you know, and it means that the person what wrote it lived there."

"But father didn't, did he?" began Duncan.

"Hold your tongue till I've read it," Elsie replied. "I can't stop to explain beforehand. This is it:—

"'Dear Mrs. MacDouga I have to be teller of very bad new sister, my poor wife die morning. It will not be a shock to you than it wa me. I had no thought it was likely to happen a few hours previous sent her love to you her mother.

The two little things ar but I have been what I can do with th I have not seen them'"

(here the page turns over and the missing words are from the commencement of the line)—

"'night and I don't feel to see them yet. The sound ir voices is too much for hat can I, a helpless wer do for them. They be better off among their kinsfolk than left mercy of strangers. I often I made a mistake in nging poor Nannie to this cat crowded city away from ive moors. The children I am told eak and delicate. There be a chance for them'"

(here the fresh page begins)—

"'in their mother's native The woman who has charge trustworthy. She shall brin to you, if you will take they live, bring them up with your own, and as your own. the girl turns out anything her mother, she will be we enough. I shall not interfe the children. All I want to is that they are well care In a year or two I may able to interest myself them. For the pres'"

(fresh page)—

"'likely I shall wander t, Reply at once Yours truly, R. Grosvenor.'"

When Elsie had finished reading she sat looking at Duncan. "It doesn't seem very plain," he ventured to say, presently; "and there wasn't anything about you or me in it. You said there was."

mrs. macdougall glanced at her mother (p. 8).

"Stupid little thing! isn't there some of it torn off? and when you put the words in it's easy enough to read. I've put them in to myself. First of all, it's about Aunt Nannie dying, isn't it?"

"I s'pose it is," Duncan agreed; "and it's writ by Uncle Richard, isn't it?"

"If you call him Uncle Richard. I say it's our father what wrote it—yours and mine, Duncan."

Duncan stared at her in puzzled silence. "But Aunt Nannie was our Aunt Grosvenor, wasn't she?" he asked.

"If you call her Aunt Grosvenor. I say she was our mother. I'm sure she was," said Elsie.

"Our mother!" Duncan said, under his breath. "What do you mean, Elsie?"

"The letter says something about two little babies," Elsie began.

"Does it?" Duncan asked. "I didn't hear it."

"Well, it says, the 'little things,' and that's the same; and it's all about sending them to Aunt Nannie's native place. Well, this is Aunt Nannie's native place; and who were the two little things, eh?"

"I'm sure I dunno," Duncan said slowly.

"Well, they weren't Robbie, were they? Then, who were they? Why, you an' me, of course. It says 'the girl' somewhere, an' of course that's me. So now, isn't the letter about us? an' that's why granny was so afraid of losing it. Do you see now, little silly? It's plain enough."

"But why did they?" murmured Duncan.

"That's the funny part of it. They ought to have told us. Why didn't she?"

"Who?"

"Why, Robbie's mother, of course. She isn't our mother, an' I'm not going to call her mother; I shall call her 'she.' You can call her what you like. Why does she pretend to be our mother when she isn't? It's different with granny, 'cos she's our granny right enough. Didn't I hear her say 'Meg 'ud rue it?' It's a shame to have made a secret of it."

Duncan had been turning it over in his poor little mind. He formed ideas very slowly, but there was often more sense in them when formed than in the quick conclusions of cleverer children.

"But if Uncle Grosvenor is our father, Elsie, why don't we live with him? He never's been to see us, never. He'd be sure to know Aunt Nannie was our mother, and not—you know—'she.'"

"I believe," said Elsie, in a mysterious voice, "that 'R. Grosvenor' thinks we're dead."

"Oh, Elsie! but we aren't at all," gasped Duncan.

"No, I shouldn't, think so. Doesn't the letter say they are weak and delicate (what a beautiful letter it is, Duncan. I'm sure R. Grosvenor is a grand gentleman), and 'bring them up with your own and as your own for a year or two?' That was till we got strong; and she's kept us always. Of course R. Grosvenor (I'm not going to say uncle), doesn't know that we're quite well now. I'm sure he thinks we're dead. Who does 'your own' mean but Robbie. Oh, how dull you are, Duncan! Can't you see now why she pets that boy so, and makes such a fuss over him? He's her own, and we're not; she loves him and doesn't love us. Did she ever beat Robbie?"

"Robbie isn't naughty," Duncan protested; "at least, only a very little sometimes."

Elsie uttered an impatient exclamation. "Does Robbie have to fetch milk, and go to school, and pick up wood? No; he's treated different. Now you know why I don't like her."

Duncan gave vent to a sigh of perplexity. There rose up in his mind a sort of uncomfortable feeling that everything was going topsy-turvy. Somehow or another he seemed to see Robbie's mother sitting by the side of Elsie's bed when she had the fever last winter, and bustling about to get nice things for her, hushing the others with a strange look in her eyes that made them quiet at once, for they could see she was troubled. Or he seemed to smell the grateful smell of the hot cakes waiting, crisp and tempting, before the big cheerful fire, to greet them on their return from afternoon school on a dreary winter day. She had been kind, though she was so strict, especially to Elsie, and Duncan was feeling something very much like sorrow to think that, after all, she was not their mother.

"What are you going to do, Elsie?" he asked presently.

"I've just been wondering when you were going to ask me that. Of course it can't stop like this. Haven't you heard granny say how rich Uncle Grosvenor was, and what a grand place it was where he lived? Well, then, he's a grand laird, an' if we lived with him you'd be a little laird, and me a lady. Does he think we have to fetch milk and butter, and go after the hens, an' all that? But I'm goin' to let him know all about it."

"How, Elsie?"

"Well," Elsie replied, "I've been thinking of that, an' it's just a real difficult matter; for I'd never get time to write all the long explanation, with that she always prying after me. She'd find it out, an' stop the letter, even if I could find the paper; an' I dunno' as I can spell all the long words it 'ud take to explain it. An' more too, I couldn't wait an' wait for the answer. We ought to go an' see Uncle—R. Grosvenor. I've almost made up my mind, Duncan, that I'll go to England an' find him."

"You couldn't do it," Duncan said.

"Couldn't I?" Elsie said scornfully, "It isn't so very far. England's another country, but it joins on. You only step out o' one into the other, for I looked most particular; an' there wasn't even mountains to get over. There's only what folk call the border, an' I'm sure that isn't much. P'raps it's a line, or a road, or a ditch, or something like it. You go straight out of Scotland—as straight as ever you can go. I've looked on the map. Give it me now. If you go from Dunster you've only to keep in a straight line till you get into England, an' any one'll tell you the way to London."

"I'm sure it's a dreadful long way," Duncan said disconsolately. "I should be frightened while you was gone, till you came back."

"Come back," said Elsie. "I shan't never do that, I hope. When I find my father he'll take care o' me. Now then, will you come with me, Duncan?"

"I don't think I'd go, Elsie. We might get lost," Duncan urged. "I wish you could write a letter instead."

"I've made up my mind to go if I do anything at all," Elsie said, in a tone of decision. "You needn't come unless you like."

Duncan looked perplexed again. This was indeed an awkward predicament. The thought of running away to England didn't seem nice, somehow, but if Elsie went and he stayed, how frightened he'd be all the time about her; and when they questioned him, how would he be able to keep her secret, especially if Robbie's mother had that troubled look in her eyes? and how lonely it would be going backwards and forwards across the moor all alone without Elsie.

"I wish you wouldn't go, Elsie," he said to her presently.

"Most likely I shall," Elsie replied. "Mind you tell no tales. We must be quick home now. Come along; I shall have to think of ever so many things before we go, so you'll have plenty o' time to know whether you'll come or stay behind. Oh, I know I shall be a real lady, Duncan, an' have bonny clothes. Of course I shouldn't like fetching milk an' things when I'm a little lady born. Isn't it a shame, Duncan?"

"I dunno; I don't mind," Duncan then said.

"Give me the atlas," Elsie said; "I must get away an' have a goodish look at it when we get in, for you must be quite sure and take it back this afternoon."

But Elsie was not to "get away," for Mrs. MacDougall was waiting at the gate with a basket by her side.

"You've been loiterin' again," she cried briskly. "I've been waitin' this half-hour for you to take these beans down to the shop. Here's a bit o' bread you can eat along the road, an' you'll have just to make haste."

Elsie cast a defiant glance at the basket as she took it slowly up. She knew too well its destination. The neatly tied-up bundles of young well-grown beans lying on the fresh cabbage-leaves would be one of the attractions of the village shop. A day or two ago all the plums that were ripe had gone the same way, to the children's disgust. Mrs. MacDougall was a clever gardener, and had a ready sale for her small stock of produce. To-day Elsie and Duncan would get no dinner beyond the bit of bread. That was the result of their loitering. They had lost the valuable time through their talk over the letter.

But Elsie quite lost sight of the fact that she alone was responsible for losing it, and was very angry about it.

"I have quite decided," she said to Duncan. "This is what I'll do; to England I will go!"

(To be continued.)