Page:Emily Climbs.pdf/192

 Grandfather Bradshaw, with uncanny suddenness and positiveness.

“There, there now, Grandfather, I advise not to get worked up. And this is the twentieth century now. He’s still living back there. His memory stopped a few years ago. What might your names be? Burnley? Starr? From Blair Water? Oh, then you'll know the Murrays? Niece? Oh!”

Mrs. Julia Hollinger’s “Oh” was subtly eloquent. She had been setting dishes and food down at a rapid rate on the clean oil-cloth on the table. Now she swept them aside, extracted a table-cloth from a drawer of the cupboard, got silver forks and spoons out of another drawer, and a handsome pair of salt and pepper shakers from the shelves.

“Don’t go to any trouble for us,” pleaded Emily.

“Oh, it’s no trouble. If all was well here you'd find Mrs. Bradshaw real glad to have you. She’s a very kind woman, poor soul. It’s awful hard to see her in such trouble. Allan was all the child she had, you see.”

“A child can’t be in the nineteenth century, I tell you,” repeated Grandfather Bradshaw, with an irritable shift of emphasis.

“No—no,” soothingly, “of course not, Grandfather. Little Allan’ll turn up all right yet. Here’s a hot cup o’ tea for you. I advise you to drink it. ’ll keep him quiet for a bit. Not that he’s ever very fussy—only everybody’s a bit upset—except old Mrs. McIntyre. Nothing ever upsets. It’s just as well, only it seems to me real unfeeling. ’Course, she isn’t just right. Come, sit in and have a bite, girls. Listen to that rain, will you? The men will be soaked. They can’t search much longer tonight—Will will soon be home. I sorter dread it—Clara’ll go wild again when he comes home without little Allan. We had a terrible time with her last night, pore thing.”

“A child can’t be lost in the century,” said