Books › The second violin, 1906 › scan 29
Scan 29
The second violin, 1906
8 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 9. See the scan on archive.org.
1But in an instant, he looked up again and spoke in the cheery tone they knew so well.
3"Now listen, and be brave," he said. "Mother's trouble is like a house just set on fire. A dash of water and a blanket—and it is out. Wait till a whole room is ablaze, and it's a serious matter to stop it. Now, in our case, we've only the little kindling corner to smother, and the New Mexico air is water and blanket—a whole fire department, if need be. The doctor assures me that with mother's good constitution, and the absence of any hereditary predisposition to this sort of thing, we've only to give her the ten or twelve months of rest and reënforcement—the winter in New Mexico, the summer in Colorado—to nip the whole thing in the bud. I believe him, and you must believe him—and me. More than all, you must not show the slightest change of front to her. She knows it all, but she doesn't want you to know. I think differently about that.
5"Three of you are men and women now, and the other two," he smiled into the upturned, eager faces of Jeff and Justin, "are getting to be men. Even my youngest can be depended upon to act the strong part."
7Justin scrambled to his feet at that, and gravely laid a muscular boy's hand in his father's.
The computer misreads some letters and numbers. Where a name matters to you, read the scan.