“There's father, there's father!” she cried, as Harry joined his wife
at the rail and they lifted the wealth of roses from the box and waved
them.
“We've wronged him, Harry!” exclaimed Julia, trying to see the little
face below through her misty eyes. “How I love him for bringing me these
sweet things! It gives me such a different feeling about him.”
“Oh, father would as soon forget his breakfast as roses for a woman he
was seeing off,” returned Harry without enthusiasm, while he waved his
hat energetically.
The steamer pulled out. The faces in the crowd mingled and changed
places.
“I've lost them, I've lost them!” cried Julia. “Oh, where are they,
Harry.”
“Over there near the corner. I can see father. It's all right, dear,”
choking a little. “Jewel was skipping and laughing a minute ago. It will
only be a few weeks, but confound it,” violently, “next time we'll take
her!”
Julia buried her face in the roses, on which twinkled a sudden dew, and
tried to gather promise from their sweet breath.
Jewel strained her eyes to follow the now indistinguishable forms on the
lofty deck, and her grandfather looked down at the small figure in the
sailor suit, the short thick pigtails of flaxen hair tied with large
bows of ribbon, and the doll clasped in one arm. At last the child
turned her head and looked up, and their eyes met for the first time.
“Jove, she does look like Harry!” muttered Mr. Evringham, and even as he
spoke the plain little face was illumined with the smile he knew, that
surpassingly sweet smile which promised so much and performed nothing.
The child studied him with open, innocent curiosity.
“I can't believe it's you,” she said at last, in a voice light and
winning, a voice as sweet as the smile.
“I don't wonder. I don't quite know myself this morning,” he replied
brusquely.
“We have a picture of you, but it's a long-ago one, and I thought
by this time you would be old, and--and bent over, you know, the way
grandpas are.”
Even in that place of drays and at eight o'clock A.M. these words fell
not disagreeably upon irritated ears.
“I think myself Nature did not intend me to be a grandpa,” he replied.
“Oh, yes, you're just the right kind,” returned the child hastily and
confidently. “Strong and--and handsome.”
Mr. Evringham looked at her in amazement. “The little rascal!” he
thought. “Has she been coached?”
“I suppose we may get away from here now,” he said aloud. “There's
nothing more to wait for.”
“Didn't the roses make mother happy?” asked the little girl, trotting
along beside his long strides. “I think it was wonderful for you to
bring them so early in the morning.”
Mr. Evringham summoned a cab.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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