"MabelCHawley-FourLittleBlossomsOnAppleTreeIsland" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hawley Mabel C)

the spot where Mr. Winthrop, a year or so later, built his bungalow. Your mother
started off for a walk one day with Bobby, and she walked too far; he was heavy
for a baby, and she should never have tried to carry him. But she did, and she
walked as far as the other end of the island before her strength gave out. Then
what do you suppose she did, Meg?"
Meg looked serious.
"I don't know," she admitted. "Maybe she cried?"
"Mothers don't cry," said Twaddles in fine scorn. "Do they, Daddy?"
"I cried," confessed Mother Blossom, smiling at the astonished Twaddles. "I'll
never forget how I feltЧso far from home and with a heavy, fretting baby in my
arms. I just sat down on a rock and cried. And Bobby cried with me."
The four little Blossoms were too amazed to speak. To think of Mother crying!
"Pretty soon some one came along the road," Father Blossom went on with the
story, "and, of course, they saw Mother and Bobby crying. This some one was a
woman in a gray wrapper, pushing a baby carriage in which were two little
children and a great many packages. The children were two boys about three and
four years old, and the woman was their mother. She said her name was Mrs.
Harley and that she lived about a quarter of a mile further on. She was very
good indeed to MotherЧmade her little boys get out and walk and put Bobby in
with the bundles. Then she helped Mother as far as her house, gave her hot tea
and some bread and butter, and kept her until Mr. Harley came home. He had a
rickety old buggy and a shabby horse and he harnessed up and brought Mother and
Bobby home in great style."
"That was nice," said Meg with satisfaction. "Can we go and see Mrs. Harley when
we get to Apple Tree Island?"
"There is no Mrs. Harley there now," answered Father Blossom almost sadly. "She
came to see Mother several times that summer. Mr. Harley was shiftless and easy
going, but extremely fond of his family. They lived in a shack, but they loved
each other devotedly and that, you know, is much better than having a fine
house. Well, Mother never went to Apple Tree Island againЧyou youngsters kept
her too busy. But I went nearly every year because I've always had to look after
some property there for an invalid friend of Aunt Polly's. I never went that I
didn't see the Harleys and carry them some message or gift from Mother. Four
years ago Mrs. Harley met me with the news that her husband had disappeared."
"Was he drowned?" asked Twaddles fearfully.
"No, no one thought so," answered Father Blossom. "Mrs. Harley said that he had
been acting queerly all that WinterЧthat he would go for days without speaking,
and then fly into a rage if any one asked him a question." "He was always so
good to his family," said Mother Blossom, smoothing Meg's hair absently. "He
must have been out of his mind, Ralph."
"I think so myself," agreed Father Blossom. "Anyway, Mrs. Harley told me that
one morning, a wet, cold day in March, he got up before it was light, lit a fire
in the kitchen stove and went out of the house. They never saw him again. He had
a rowboat and this they found abandoned on the south shore of Sunset Lake,
showing that he must have rowed over to the mainland.
"The next summer, when I went to Apple Tree Island, I was told that Mrs. Harley
and the children had also disappeared," continued Father Blossom. "She had gone,
leaving no trace, and taking the two little boys with her. I went to see the
shack and she had left it as neat as wax inside and not one scrap of paper
anywhere to give a clue as to what she intended to do."