Date: Thu, 26 Oct 2006 20:26:15 +0800
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Uncle Jehiel, it does seem to me I cant have it so! All my life Ive looked forward to bein a sailor and goin around the world, and all. I just hate the valley and the mountains! But I guess I got to stay. Shes only my step-mother, I know, but she was always awful good to me, and she hasnt got anybody else to look after her. His voice broke, and he put his arm up in a crook over his face. But its awful hard! I feel like a bird thats got caught in a snare. The day before he went back to his own home, now so strange to him, he was out with her, searching for some lost turkey-chicks, and found one with its foot caught in a tangle of rusty wire. The little creature had beaten itself almost to death in its struggle to get way. Kneeling in the grass, and feeling the wild palpitations of its heart under his rescuing hand, he had called to his sister, Oh, look! Poor thing! Its most dead, and yet it aint really hurt a mite, only desperate, over bein held fast. His voice broke in a sudden wave of sympathy: Oh, aint it terrible to feel so! The trunks being now ready, he DE- after kissing his mother andsisters, and once more pressing to his bosom his adored Gretchen, who,your choice, theyre all the same price; I dont know which one is right --the situation. Let him talk right along, fearlessly; let him pour hisindifferent German forth, and when he lacks for a word, let him heave a But now, walking home under the frosty stars, he felt very quiet already, as though he needed no weight to lie heavy on his restless heart. It did not seem restless now, but very still, as though it too were dead. He noticed that the air was milder, and as he crossed the bridge below his house he stopped and listened. Yes, the fine ear of his experience caught a faint grinding sound. By to-morrow the river would begin to break up. It was the end of winter. He surprised himself by his pleasure in thinking of the spring.
