"Won't somebody tell me what it means?" Hugh gasped, stretching out his
hands toward Rocket, who even attempted to lick them.
At this point Alice stepped forward, and taking Rocket's bridle, laid it
across Hugh's lap, saying, softly: "It means that Rocket is yours, purchased by a friend, saved from
Harney, for you. Mount him, and see if he rides as easily as ever. I am
impatient to be off."
But had Hugh's life depended upon it, he could not have mounted Rocket
then. He knew the friend was Alice, and the magnitude of the act
overpowered him.
"Oh, Miss Johnson," he cried, "what made you do it? It must not be. I
cannot suffer it."
"Not to please me?" and Alice's face wore its most winning look. "It's
been my fixed determination ever since I heard of Rocket, and knew how
much you loved him. I was never so happy doing an act in my life, and
now you must not spoil it all by refusing."
"As a loan, then, not as a gift," Hugh whispered. "It shall not be a
gift."
"It need not," Alice rejoined, as a sudden plan for carrying out another
project crossed her mind. "You shall pay for Rocket if you like, and
I'll tell you how on our ride. Shall we go?"
Once out upon the highway, where there were no mud holes to shun, no
gates to open and shut, Hugh broached the subject of Rocket again, when
Alice told him unhesitatingly how he could, if he would, pay for him and
leave her greatly his debtor. The scrap of paper, which Muggins had
saved from the letter thrown by Hugh upon the carpet, had been placed by
the queer little child in an old envelope, which she called her letter
to Miss Alice. Handing it to her that morning with the utmost gravity,
she had asked her to read "Mug's letter," and Alice had read the brief
lines written by 'Lina: "Hugh must send the money, as I told him before.
He can sell Mug; Harney likes pretty darkies." There was a cold, sick
feeling at Alice's heart, a shrinking with horror from 'Lina
Worthington, and then she came to a decision. Mug should be hers, and
so, as skillfully as she could she brought it around, that having taken
a great fancy both to Lulu and Muggins, she wished to buy them both,
giving whatever Hugh honestly thought they were worth. Rocket, if he
pleased, should be taken as part or whole payment for Mug, and so cease
to be a gift.
"I have no mercenary motives in the matter," she said, "With me they
will be free, and this, I am sure, will be an inducement for you to
consent to my proposal."
A slave master can love his bond servant, and Hugh loved the little Mug
so much that the idea of parting with her as he surely must at some
future time if he assented to Alice's plan, made him hesitate. But he
decided at last, influenced not so much by need of money as by knowing
how much real good the exchange of ownership would be to the two young
girls. In return for Rocket, Alice should have Muggins, while for Lulu
she might give what she liked.