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By Root 759 0

she will be less likely to come upon someone who might recognize her. For though there are many who know the story of the catastrophe, there are fewer who might recognize her face, which, in any event, has changed in the four years she has been away. Her brow has grown more defined, her chin perhaps is sharper. When the sun is out, she wears darkened spectacles she once purchased when she was at Hastings. She knows, however, that she cannot remain unnoticed for long, nor keep the fact that she is in residence from her nearest neighbors. Already there has been some curiosity — passersby looking in at the wash on the line in the backyard, small boys peering at her as she rakes dried leaves from the underbrush — and if her neighbors know about her presence, it will be only a matter of time before her father does. Thus one afternoon not long after she takes up residence, she sits down at her old writing desk and composes a letter.

She writes her father that she is at Fortune’s Rocks and that she has decided to remain there for some time. She writes that she cannot be dissuaded from her intent and that she will not return to Hastings Seminary in the fall. She adds that if he insists upon ousting her from the cottage, she will sever her ties with her family forever. She does not wish to hurt him, she says; she merely wishes to be left alone. Finally, she tells him that she is in need of funds, since the house requires many repairs, which she enumerates. In addition, she has little money of her own left.

For days after Olympia writes the letter, she expects a reply. When a letter does not immediately come, she anticipates, and then dreads, her father’s arrival in person. Every time she hears a carriage on the road, she starts. On the twelfth day, however, the postman brings an envelope with familiar handwriting.

3 August 1903

My dear Olympia,

I was shocked to hear that you are at Fortune’s Rocks. I do not think it a suitable place for you to be. And I am sorrier than I can say to learn that you wish to abandon your studies at Hastings. I confess I had harbored hopes that you would find some satisfaction in teaching and that you would take solace in being independent. But I cannot find it in my heart to chastise you further. Perhaps satisfaction and solace are not what you wish for yourself. I confess that I would not have cared greatly for such virtues at your age, though I value them most highly now.

You should have written to me at once, Olympia. I had a letter from Dean Bardwell within days of your abandoning your post. She was necessarily quite alarmed that you had vanished, and she managed to pass that considerable alarm on to me. I was given to understand that you had left voluntarily, but even so, I was greatly worried for you. For a time, I thought that somehow that man had made contact with you, and you had run away with him. I assume you are telling me the truth, and that you are not, in fact, with him now.

I worry about you, Olympia. I do not know how you will manage in that draughty cottage. But if you are determined to take up residence there, I shall not stand in your way. I have no desire ever to return to that house or to the coast of New Hampshire again. I will, of course, be forced to sell the cottage one day, but I have no plans for that at the moment, since I doubt I should get any great price for it in today’s financial climate.

Your mother and I are sorry not to be with you on your twentieth birthday. Please know that we think of you daily. And please write to me from time to time. I need to know that you are well.

Your loving father

P.S. Please find enclosed a check for one hundred and fifty dollars. All bills for major repairs to the house should be sent directly to me.

When Olympia has finished reading the letter, she bends her forehead to the kitchen table. She cannot bear to think of her father sad. For a few moments, all she wants is to pack a valise and make her way to the train station so that she might return to Boston and be embraced by her parents. She thinks of all the days her father