was your ma’s maiden name. You can take ’em if you’d keer to have ’em.”
“Oh, thank you—thank you,” cried Anne, clasping the packet rapturously.
“That was all that was in the house,” said her hostess. “The furniture was all sold to pay the doctor bills, and Mrs. Thomas got your ma’s clothes and little things. I reckon they didn’t last long among that drove of Thomas youngsters. They was destructive young animals, as I mind ’em.”
“I haven’t one thing that belonged to my mother,” said Anne, chokily. “I—I can never thank you enough for these letters.”
“You’re quite welcome. Laws, but your eyes is like your ma’s. She could just about talk with hers. Your father was sorter homely but awful nice. I mind hearing folks say when they was married that there never was two people more in love with each other—Pore creatures, they didn’t live much longer; but they was awful happy while they was alive, and I s’pose that counts for a good deal.”
Anne longed to get home to read her precious letters; but she made one little pilgrimage first. She went alone to the green corner of the “old” Bolingbroke cemetery where her father and mother were buried, and left on their grave the white flowers she carried. Then she hastened back to Mount Holly, shut herself up in her room, and read the letters. Some were written by her father, some by her mother. There were not many—only a dozen in all—for Walter and Bertha
