Ethelyn's Mistake

Was she welcome? Answer, the low cry, and gasping sob, and outstretched

arms, which held the wanderer in so loving an embrace, while a rain of

tears fell upon the dear head from which the bonnet had fallen back as

Ethelyn sank upon her knees before Aunt Barbara. Neither could talk much

for a few moments. Certainly not Aunt Barbara, who sat bewildered and

stupefied while Ethelyn, more composed, removed her hat, and cloak, and

overshoes, and shook out the folds of her damp dress; and then drawing a

little covered stool to Aunt Barbara's side, sat down upon it, and

leaning her elbows on Aunt Barbara's lap, looked up in her face, with

the old, mischievous, winning smile, and said, "Auntie, have you

forgiven your Ethie for running away?"

Then it began to seem real again--began to seem as if the last six years

were blotted out, and things restored to what they were when Ethie was

wont to sit at her aunt's feet as she was sitting now. There was this

difference, however; the bright, round, rosy face, which used to look so

flushed, and eager, and radiant, and assured, was changed, and the one

confronting Aunt Barbara now was pale, and thin, and worn, and there

were lines across the brow, and the eyes were heavy and tired, and a

little uncertain and anxious in their expression as they scanned the

sweet old face above them. Aunt Barbara saw it all, and this, if nothing

else, would have brought entire pardon even had she been inclined to

withhold it, which she was not. Ethie was back again, and that was

enough for her. She would not chide or blame her ever so little, and her

warm, loving hands took the thin white face and held it while she kissed

the parted lips, the blue-veined forehead, and the hollow cheeks,

whispering: "My own darling. I am so glad to have you back. I have been

so sad without you, and mourned for you so much, fearing you were dead.

Where has my darling been that none of us could find you?"

"Did you hunt, Aunt Barbara? Did you really hunt for me?"

And something of Ethie's old self leaped into her eyes and flushed into

her cheeks as she asked the question.

"Yes, darling. All the spring and all the summer long, and on into the

fall, and then I gave it up."

"Were you alone, auntie? That is, did nobody help you hunt?" was

Ethelyn's next query; and Richard would have read much hope for him in

the eagerness of the eyes, which waited for Aunt Barbara's answer, and

which dropped so shyly upon the carpet when Aunt Barbara said, "Alone,

child? No; he did all he could--Richard did--but we could get no clew."

Ethelyn could not tell her story until she had been made easy on several

important points, and smoothing the folds of Aunt Barbara's dress, and

still looking beseechingly into her face, she said, "and Richard

hunted, too. Was he sorry, auntie? Did he care because I went away?"