Free (1993) The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields Page A

chest, as has the regular application of a mullein-leaf poultice at bedtime. As for myself, I keep very well.
    Yours faithfully, Clarentine Flett Dear Mr. Goodwill, I thank you for yours of the 28th, and assure you that Daisy is in excellent health. Her school recitation, "A Sailor’s Lament," was given with the greatest feeling and enthusiasm.
    We were most interested to read of you and your famous tower in last week’s Tribune. My son, Professor Flett, regarding the tower’s rather blurred likeness on the page, grew most curious to see it as it really is, but as you know he never travels anymore to Tyndall since his brothers have gone West.
    Yours most sincerely, Clarentine Flett My dear Father, It gives me pain that I must once again apply to you for money. I do beseech you to search your conscience and give a thought to the many years in which you and my Mother lived in harmony, during which time she served most dutifully and lovingly with never any thought of compensation. Our day-to-day situation here is exceptionally insecure at the moment, and I now fear that my decision to purchase the Simcoe Street house, as well as the land that adjoins it, was premature, particularly with the city moving southward, and now talk of war. My actions, I assure you, proceeded from the wish to provide Daisy, who is growing into a fine young girl, with a reliable and respectable home of which she need never feel ashamed. It is true that my Mother does earn some income from the sale of plants and herbs, but the cost of constructing a greenhouse has been considerable. It is also true, as you say, that my own earnings have been augmented by the licensing of the "Marquis" wheat hybrid, but fully three-quarters of these earnings remain the property of the College. I look forward, with hope, to your favorable reply.
    You may be interested to know that "Goodwill Tower," as it is known in the city, is much talked of these days, and I am told it draws visitors from all over the region, and even from the United States.
    Your son, Barker Dear Mr. Goodwill, This little note will, I hope, bring you the assurance that Daisy is now fully recovered from the attack of measles. It has been a most distressing time, and very tiresome indeed for her to remain so many weeks in a darkened room, particularly as she is by nature an active and healthy child. She was much cheered, however, to discover a photograph of you in the pages of last week’s Family Herald, standing in front of your tower. "Is that truly my father?" she demanded of me, and I assured her that indeed it was. She became most anxious to pay you a visit, and would talk of nothing else for days, but we believe, Professor Flett as much as myself, that such a visit would cause too much excitation in one so recently recovered from a serious illness.
    We remain grateful for your monthly contribution to our household. We manage the best we can on a limited purse, and happily my little garden enterprise is beginning to thrive. It is as if all the world has discovered the happiness that simple flowers can bring to an otherwise dreary wartime existence.
    Yours, Clarentine Flett Dear Mr. Goodwill, I thank you most sincerely for your prayers and for your words of condolence. I can tell you truthfully that my dear Mother did not suffer in her final days, having entered into a state of unconsciousness the moment the dreadful accident occurred. Those friends and acquaintances who kept vigil at her bedside found in her repose a source of strength and inspiration. She was laid to rest, finally, amid friends and family, both my brothers arriving from the West in time to pay their respects. Our Father, as you know, remained hardened in his heart to the end, and it is for him we must now direct our prayers. Regarding the young cyclist who struck my Mother down, he has been fined the sum of twenty-five dollars, and I am told the poor fellow is fairly ill with remorse.
    I have been thinking much these last days