Dora Deane | Page 5

was added a postscript, in a strange
handwriting, saying she was dead. There was a moisture in Mrs.
Deane's eyes as she read the touching lines; and leaning her heated
forehead against the cool window pane, she, too, thought of the years
gone by--of the gentle girl, the companion of her childhood, who had
never given her an unkind word--of _him_-- the only man she had ever
loved--and Dora was their child--Fanny's child and John's.
"Yes," she said, half aloud, "I will give her a home," but anon there
came stealing over her the old bitterness of feeling, which she had
cherished since she knew that Fanny was preferred to herself, and then
the evil of her nature whispered, "No, I will not receive their child. We
can hardly manage to live now, and it is not my duty to incur an
additional expense. Dora must stay where she is, and if I do not answer

the letter, she will naturally suppose I never received it."
Thus deciding the matter, she crushed the letter into her pocket and
went back to her work; but there was an added weight upon her spirits,
while continually ringing in her ears were the words, "Care for John's
child and mine." "If I could only make her of any use to me," she said
at last, and then as her eye fell upon Bridget, whose stay with her was
so uncertain, the dark thought entered her mind, "Why could not Dora
fill her place? It would be a great saving, and of course the child must
expect to work."
Still, reason as she would, Mrs. Deane could not at once bring herself
to the point of making a menial of one who was every way her equal;
neither could she decide to pass the letter by unnoticed; so for the
present she strove to dismiss the subject, which was not broached to her
daughters until the evening on which we first introduced them to our
readers. Then taking her seat by the brightly burning lamp, she drew
the letter from her pocket and read it aloud, while Alice drummed an
occasional note upon the piano and Eugenia beat a tattoo upon the
carpet with her delicate French slipper.
"Of course she won't come," said Alice, as her mother finished reading.
"It was preposterous in Aunt Fanny to propose such a thing!" and she
glanced towards Eugenia for approbation of what she had said.
Eugenia's quick, active mind had already looked at the subject in all its
bearings, and in like manner with her mother she saw how Dora's
presence there would be a benefit; so to Alice's remark she replied: "It
will sound well for us to have a cousin in the poorhouse, won't it? For
my part, I propose that she comes, and then be made to earn her own
living. We can dismiss Bridget, who is only two years older than Dora,
and we shall thus avoid quarreling regularly with her vixenish mother,
besides saving a dollar every week--"
"So make a drudge of Dora," interrupted Alice. "Better leave her in the
poorhouse at once."
"Nobody intends to make a drudge of her," retorted Eugenia. "Mother

works in the kitchen, and I wonder if it will hurt Dora to help her.
Every girl ought to learn to work!"
"Except Eugenia Deane," suggested Alice, laughing, to think how little
her sister's practise accorded with her theory.
At this point in the conversation, Bridget entered, bringing a letter
which bore the India post-mark, together with the unmistakable
handwriting of Nathaniel Deane!
"A letter from Uncle Nat, as I live!" exclaimed Eugenia. "What is going
to happen? He hasn't written before in years. I do wish I knew when he
expected to quit this mundane sphere, and how much of his money he
intends leaving me!"
By this time Mrs. Deane had broken the seal, uttering an exclamation
of surprise as a check for $500 fell into her lap.
"Five hundred dollars!" screamed Eugenia, catching up the check and
examining it closely, to see that there was no mistake. "The old miser
has really opened his heart. Now, we'll have some genuine silver forks
for our best company, so we shan't be in constant terror lest some one
should discover that they are only plated. I'll buy that set of pearls at
Mercer's, too, and, Alice, you and I will nave some new furs. I'd go to
Rochester to-morrow, if it were not Sunday. What shall we get for you,
mother? A web of cloth, or an ounce of sewing silk?" and the heartless
girl turned towards her mother, whose face was white as ashes, as she
said faintly: "The money is not ours. It is Dora's-- to be used for her
benefit."
"Not ours! What do