The Open Window: Tales of the MonthsWright, Mabel Osgood
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The Open Window: Tales of the Months
Wright, Mabel Osgood
American fiction -- 20th century; Short stories, American
“The desk and all the wall-papers Miss Sallie chose for the
refurnishings!” cried Mrs. Terry; “it’s actually like having some one to
share the responsibility of it all. Ah, you see, Mrs. Evan, I told you
that dreary old March is my lucky month; another thirty days and it
might have been too late.”
The day that the deed was transferred, father handed Mrs. Terry the key
of the old secretary. Whispering to me, “I don’t want even Terry to come
up yet, only you must be with me when I open it, for you understand,”
she literally pulled me up the narrow stairs.
Dragging up the big arm-chair, she seated herself in it and turned the
key slowly in the creaking lock. As the flap fell back, revealing a row
of pigeon-holes and two shallow drawers, she whispered, “I don’t know
exactly whether I’m opening a treasure chest or a grave!”
After some hesitation, she pulled out a drawer and took from it a bundle
of yellow papers, folded lengthwise and tied with a faded blue ribbon.
“‘Letters from R. M. to S. D., preserved to show my kin how good a man
their foolish aunt lost through thinking that land could weigh in the
balance with love,’” read Mrs. Terry, reddening deeply; “and here is a
picture of grandpa cut from black paper, and a queer curl of hair. Ah,
_now_ I see where my inquisitive hair comes from.
“‘A letter of advice to my kin if they think to marry, and a request.’”
Mrs. Terry read this slowly to herself, saying as she did so, “I hope
she wants something I can do for her.”
There was a long silence, so long that I looked up rather anxiously at
last.
“What is it?” I asked.
“She wants grandpa’s name to be given to the first child that is born in
this house,” said Mrs. Terry, in an awestruck tone, “and that seems to
me like a loaf and fish miracle, for I was _so_ afraid that Terry would
want to call him for his own people, and his father’s name was Patrick
Dennis! Oh, how nice it is to have even a might-have-been grandmother to
shoulder such responsibilities!” And once more she threw herself into my
arms as she had done the afternoon in the attic, peeping over my
shoulder at the hooded mahogany cradle into which the beams of the
victorious snow-quelling March sun were shining.
“Something seems to have turned up, or else we have all gone
snow-blind,” said Evan that night.
IV
THE IMMIGRANTS
=APRIL=—THE GOOSE MOON
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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