Love stories; New England -- Social life and customs -- 20th century -- Fiction
"Not perhaps in the same way. He does not see quite as I do, but he is a
good man and loves everything good." Some recollection made the speaker
smile. "I try his soul at times by not doing what he calls minding my
own business. For instance, once I saw a young fellow at an elevated
station in New York, dazed by drink. I was in haste and on an important
errand, but I couldn't take my train and leave him there. So I went and
sat down beside him and asked him where he was going. He said, to the
Brooklyn ferry, but he was thick and helpless. I called a little colored
boy carrying a large milliner's box, and I asked him if his errand
needed to be done immediately. He was pretty doubtful, but he finally
said no. So I told him I would check his box and leave a dollar with it
for him when he returned, if he would take this young man straight to
the Brooklyn ferry and see that he did not go in anywhere on the way. He
said he would do so, and I gave him his check and car fare and some
nickels for telephoning, and asked him to call me up that evening. I
wrote my telephone number and left it with the box. He promised, and my
train came along and I had to leave them. About six o'clock that
afternoon, the telephone rang. It was my messenger. He said that when he
got the young man downstairs to go to the train for the ferry, his
charge became violently sick. After that, he came to himself and gave a
different direction to the boy. The address of an office building. He
was pale and shaky. So the boy stayed with him. They went up in an
elevator and into an office where the young man said that he had brought
the money. They sent for some one from another office, and to this
person the young man gave a roll of a thousand dollars.
"Of course, I was quite excited, and happy over this news, and I thanked
my messenger and said: 'See what God has helped us to do to-day. That
young man might have been robbed, and would have been suspected of theft
by his employer and lost his character and his position.' My husband was
sitting near by, reading the paper, and he looked up and said: 'Who on
earth are you talking to?' I just answered: 'A little darky boy!' and
went on, while my husband stared. When I told him the whole story, he
laughed and shook his head. 'Hopeless,' he said, 'hopeless.' He is quite
conservative, and he would like me to stay in the beaten track."
"That was fine," said Diana. "Mr. Lowell will be in sympathy with this
case, I hope, and undertake it with his whole heart. I am going to give
you a check to send him as a retainer. Then he will know that this is a
serious business matter."
The girl sat down at her desk and wrote the check and Mrs. Lowell took
it thankfully. She went to her room and wrote her letter. In due time
she received a reply.
_Dear One_,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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