Without even a "how d'you
do?" she plunged into her subject. That's Betty all over; she always
goes right to the point. "Papa," she said earnestly, "I'm awfully--that
is, _very_, _very_ sorry we went to Mr. Erveng that time about your
book, without first speaking to you about it. We're all _very_
sorry,--Phil, Felix, and I,--and just as ashamed as we can be. We've
worried dreadfully over it, and about you, and it was simply _awful_
when we thought you were going to die! We didn't acknowledge it to one
another, but if you had died, I know we three'd have felt as if we had
as much as killed you" (here Betty's voice dropped to almost a whisper;
I thought perhaps she was going to cry, but she didn't, she just went on
louder); "for we are sure you never would have hurried so with--your
book--if we hadn't played that mean joke. You see, papa, we're _so_
afraid you'll--you'll--die, or be ill, or something else dreadful if you
don't stop working so hard,--like a galley slave, as Phil says. And I've
come to ask you, for Phil, Felix, and myself, to let the hateful old
book go, and just get well and strong again; will you?"
"But if the history is completed, it can be sold, and thus bring in the
money that is so much needed in the family.
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