Dawn Eleanor Porter (free novels to read txt) 📖

done for John McGuire. And I'm so glad."

"Oh, yes, that's all right." Susan spoke without enthusiasm.

"And the book is going to be published?"

"Yes, oh, yes." Susan still spoke with a preoccupied frown.

"Why, Susan, what's the matter? I thought you'd be glad."

Susan drew a long sigh.

"I am glad, Miss Dorothy. I'm awful glad—for John McGuire. They sayit's wonderful, the change in him already. He's so proud an' happy tothink he's done it—not sinfully proud, you understand, but justhumbly proud an' glad. An' his ma says he's writin' other things now—poems an' stories, an' he's as happy as a lark all day. An' I'm awfulglad. But it's Keith hisself that I'm thinkin' of. You see, onlyyesterday I found him—cryin'."

"Crying!" Miss Dorothy seemed to have forgotten all about her haste toget away. She had Susan's arm in HER grasp now. She had pulled her toone side, too, where they could have a little sheltered place to talk,in the angle of two store windows.

"Yes, cryin'. You see, 't was like this," hurried on Susan. "Mis'McGuire was over, an' I'd been readin' a new poem to her an' him. 'Twas a real pretty one, too, if I do say it as shouldn't—the best Iever done; all about how fame an' beauty an' pleasure didn't countnothin' beside workin'. I got the idea out of something I found in amagazine. 'T was jest grand; an' it give me the perspiration rightaway to turn it into a poem. An' I did. An' 't was that I was readin'.I'd jest got it done that mornin'."

"Yes, yes," nodded Miss Dorothy. "I see."

"Well, I never thought of its meanin' anything to Keith, or of histakin' it nohow wrong; but after Mis' McGuire had gone home (she cameout an' set with me a spell first in the kitchen) I heard a queerlittle noise in the settin'-room, an' I went an' looked in. Keith wasat the table, his arms flung straight out in front of him, an' hishead bowed down. An', Miss Dorothy, he was cryin' like a baby."

"Oh, Susan, what did you do? What did you say?"

"Say? Nothin'!" Susan's eyes flashed her scorn. "Do you s'pose I'd letthat poor lamb know I see him cryin'? Well, I guess not! I backed outas soft as a feather bed, an' I didn't go near that settin'-room foran hour, nor let any one else. I was a regular dragon-fly guardin' it.Well, by an' by Keith comes out. His face was white an' strained-lookin'. But he was smiling, an' he handed out my poem—I'd left it onthe table when I come out with Mis' McGuire. 'I found this paper onthe table, Susan. It's your poem, isn't it?' he says real cheerful-like. Then he turns kind of quick an' leaves the room without anotherword.

"Well, I didn't know then that't was the poem he'd been cryin' over. Ididn't know—till this mornin'. Then somethin' he said made me seeright off."

"Why, Susan, what was it?"

"It was somethin' about—work. But first you wouldn't understand it,unless you see the poem. An' I can show it to you, 'cause I've got itright here. I'm tryin' to memorialize it, so I keep it with me all thetime, an' repeat one line over an' over till I get it. It's right herein my bag. You'll find it's the best I've wrote, Miss Dorothy; I'msure you will," she went on a bit wistfully. "You see I used a lot ofthe words that was in the magazine—not that I pleasurized it any, ofcourse. Mine's different, 'cause mine is poetry an' theirs is prosy.There! I guess maybe you can read it, even if't is my writin'," shefinished, taking a sheet of note-paper from her bag and carefullyspreading it out for Miss Dorothy to read.

And this is what Dorothy read:

CONTENTMENT

              Wealth

      I asked for the earth—but when in my hands

      It shriveled and crumbled away;

      And the green of its trees and the blue of its skies

      Changed to a somber gray.

                  Beauty

      I asked for the moon—but the shimmering thing

      Was only reflected gold,

      And vanished away at my glance and touch,

      And was then but a tale that is told.

                             Pleasure

      I asked for the stars—and lots of them came,

      And twinkled and danced for me;

      But the whirling lights soon wearied my gaze—

      I squenched their flame in the sea.

                               Fame

      I asked for the sun!—but the fiery ball,

      Brought down from its home on high,

      Scorched and blistered my finger tips,

      As I swirled it back to the sky.

                   Labor

      I asked for a hoe, and I set me to work,

      And my red blood danced as I went:

      At night I rested, and looking back,

      I counted my day well spent.

"But, Susan, I don't see," began Miss Dorothy, lifting puzzled eyesfrom the last line of the poem, "I don't see what there is about thatto make Mr. Keith—cry."

"No, I didn't, till this mornin'; an' then—Well, Keith came out intothe kitchen an' begun one of them tramps of his up an' down the room.It always drives me nearly crazy when he does that, but I can't sayanything, of course. I did begin this mornin' to talk about JohnMcGuire an' how fine it was he'd got somethin' he could do. Ithought't would take the poor boy's mind off hisself, if I could gethim talkin' about John McGuire—-he's been SO interested in John allwinter! An' so glad he could help him. You know he's always so wantedto HELP somebody hisself instead of always havin' somebody helpin'him. But, dear me, instead of its bein' a quieter now for him, it wasa regular stirrup.

"'That's just it, that's just it, Susan,' he moans. 'You've got tohave work or you die. There's nothin' in the whole world like work—YOUR WORK! John McGuire's got his work, an' I'm glad of it. Butwhere's mine? Where's mine, I tell you?'

"An' I told him he'd jest been havin' his work, helpin' John McGuire.You know it was wonderful, perfectly wonderful, Miss Dorothy, the waythem two men got hold of John McGuire. You know John wouldn't