Growing Up: A Story of the Girlhood of Judith MackenzieConklin, Nathaniel, Mrs.
General
Growing Up: A Story of the Girlhood of Judith Mackenzie
Conklin, Nathaniel, Mrs.
Christian life -- Fiction; Conduct of life -- Fiction; Girls -- Fiction; Young women -- Fiction
“He will call and bring you papers,” promised Miss Affy, tearing open
the envelope with a hair-pin.
“I wish he _would_. And a book, too. I wanted Sarah to take my book
back to the library to-day, and get another to read to-night if I
can’t sleep, but she said she hadn’t time; and, she can’t now, because
there’s supper and the mail coming in,” he groaned. “I had an awful
night last night; and if it hadn’t been for ‘Tempest and Sunshine,’ I
don’t know how I should have got through it.”
“That was enough for one night,” laughed the lady at the window
reading the letter. “I will try to find you something better than that
for to-night.”
“Will you go to the library for me? That’s just like you, Miss Affy.”
“Yes, I will go. If I cannot find anything I like I will call
somewhere else. There should be books enough in Bensalem to help you
through the night.”
“Is your letter satisfactory?” he questioned, curiously, as she
slipped it back into the envelope.
“Mrs. Mackenzie is very feeble; she wishes to come to Bensalem for the
change, and asks me to go and bring her and Judith.”
“But you and Miss Rody will not want the trouble of sick folks.”
“We want _her_,” said Miss Affy, rising; “I will leave your book in
the post-office, Mr. Gunn, so you need not blow the horn when you hear
me open the door.”
“But it may not be _you_; how shall I know?”
“True enough. Blow your horn, then.”
“You can _look_ in if it’s you, and Sarah isn’t there.”
“Where is the book to take back?”
“‘Tempest and Sunshine.’ Oh, Sarah hasn’t finished it yet. I forgot
that,” he said disappointedly. “She read it yesterday and gave me
nothing but bread and milk for supper, and I wanted pork and eggs. She
was on it long enough to finish,” he grumbled.
“No matter, then. I’ll get one for myself. It will be the first book I
have taken from the library.”
“And you such a reader, too. How many magazines do you take? I’d like
some of your old magazines while I’m laid up.”
“Mr. Brush will bring you a big bundle. But I will go to the library
now, for he may not wish to bring them to-night.”
The school library was kept at the house of one of the school
trustees; the errand gave Miss Affy another quarter of a mile to walk,
and it also gave her the opportunity of a call upon Nettie Evans,
whose small home was next door to the school-library. Cephas Brush had
told her that she knew how to kill more birds with one stone than any
woman he knew.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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