My Mother's Rival / Everyday Life Library No. 4

eerful word, the scared faces-for every one loved "my lady." One fine morning, when the snowdrops had grown more plentiful, and there was a faint sign of the coming spring in th

wept bit

"my little boy. It is as though he had just peeped out of He

My mother chose the epitaph, which I had always thought so pre

hout list slippers, the birds were carried back to the beautiful aviary-my mother's favorite nook; the doctors

o her room. I should not have known her; a pale, languid lady lay there in the place of my laughing, beautiful mother; two large blue eyes ful

id I should never see you ag

the purple and golden crocuses made the garden seem quite gay. I told her where I had found the first violets, some

e, and was carried from the bedroom where she had spent so many

e, she would dance with flying feet and run races with me in the wood. Oh, how I longed for the time when she would regain the color in her face and light in her eyes! They said I must be pa

pine thorns fell in April, and yet she

e looked better, and was talking to us about the

am quite sure, Roland, that I could walk

ul, my darling," said pap

r, "and I feel such a restless longing

ecumbent position on the sofa and stood quite upright. My father sprang from his chair with a

ll beauty when she came down amongst us once more. Then the crushing blow came. Great doctors came

the rest of her life. She was to be a hopeless, helpless cripple. She might lie on the sofa, be w

crying and sobbing like a child. He would not beli

believe it! She is so young and

the head physician, sorrowfully. "The

er?" cried my fat

of her fate; she will be more cheerful and in reality far better than if she knew the truth; it would hang over her

she is so young. Perhap

ately there is none-there is not the faintest," and, he ad

and my father dr

ust help me all your lif

thing better from Heaven than to giv

feet were to rest forever more-that in her presence I must always

f a child. I did it. No matter what I suffered, I always w

dreaming that she was never to walk out in the meads and grounds again. She was always t

a to warmer climes; summer dew and summer rain fell, the dead leaves were whirled in the autumn w

d and enjoyed all our care of her, and when the wonderful chair came from London, in which she could

a pity almost, Roland, to have sent to London

from her with t

were both sitting with her,

a wistful expression crossed her face and she said: "I would give anything on earth to walk, even only for ten minutes, by the side of the river; as I lie here I think so much about it. I know it in all its moods-when the wind hurries it and th

my father, in a broken voice. "I wi

ather. His devotion to her was something marvelous; he seemed to love her better in her helpless state than he had done when she was full of health and spirits. I admired him

oking over the park to the hills beyond, was arranged as

e carried up and down stairs. A room for her maid came next. And my father had a door so pla

id, "that I shall not gro

g, not just ye

eautiful flowers, singing birds, little fragrant fountains and all that was most lovely.

nto their cottages and look at the rosy children. They

and I woke up one morning to fi