Page:Anna Chapin--Half a dozen boys.djvu/229

Rh that, because it’s more fun to be here than at home, and they don’t write often, nor care to  hear from me, only once a month. I’ve thought it all out, and it’s reasonable enough. You see, I can’t do things much now, or by and by  when I am a man, and they want somebody  that can. Father used to say that he hoped I would study to go into his office; and mother  wanted me to take dancing lessons, so I could  go to parties and things; but of course I can’t  do that, and I s’pose they are sorry. I don’t wonder a bit. I don’t mean that they don’t care anything about me. Mother said to me one day not long before she went, ‘I love you  just as well, Fred, as if you weren’t blind.’  That was the first I’d thought much about it,  and then I began to think it over. I don’t suppose she does, quite; do you. Miss Bessie?” And he turned his face wistfully up to hers.

“Why, of course, Fred. If anything, my boy, we all love you more than ever, and it is  just because we care for you so much that we  want you to be a man we can feel proud of.”

“Do you honestly like me just as well?” persisted the boy. “I am sure mother doesn’t,