He re-dipped
his pen and wrote:
"When I look up into the little glass that hangs opposite me, I wonder if
that changed and sad face--"
Here he sat still and reflected. It sounded almost as if he might be
conceited or unmanly to be looking at his own face in the glass. No, that
would not do. So he looked for another pink sheet and began again.
"Kopje Alone,
"Monday afternoon.
"Dear Sister,--It is hardly six months since I left you to come to this
spot, yet could you now see me I know what you would say, I know what
mother would say--'Can that be our Greg--that thing with the strange look
in his eyes?'
"Yes, Jemima, it is your Greg, and the change has been coming over me ever
since I came here; but it is greatest since yesterday. You know what
sorrows I have passed through, Jemima; how unjustly I was always treated at
school, the masters keeping me back and calling me a blockhead, though, as
they themselves allowed, I had the best memory of any boy in the school,
and could repeat whole books from beginning to end. You know how cruelly
father always used me, calling me a noodle and a milksop, just because he
couldn't understand my fine nature. You know how he has made a farmer of
me instead of a minister, as I ought to have been; you know it all, Jemima;
and how I have borne it all, not as a woman, who whines for every touch,
but as a man should--in silence.
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