"Oh, Elsie! Elsie! dear, dear little Elsie!" cried Adelaide, flinging herself upon the bed, and pressing her lips to the cold cheek. "I have only just learned to know your value, and now you are taken from me. Oh! Elsie, darling, precious one; oh! that I had sooner learned your worth! that I had done more to make your short life happy!"
Chloe was sobbing at the foot of the bed, "Oh! my child! my child! Oh! now dis ole heart will break for sure!" while the kind-hearted physician stood wiping his eyes and sighing deeply.
"Her poor father!" exclaimed Mrs. Travilla at length.
"Yes, yes, I will go to him," said Adelaide quickly. "I promised to call him the moment she waked, and now—oh, now, I must tell him she will never wake again."
"No!" replied Mrs. Travilla, "rather tell him that she has waked in heaven, and is even now singing the song of the redeemed."
Adelaide turned to Elsie's writing-desk, and taking from it the packet which the child had directed to be given to her father as soon as she was gone, she carried it to him.
Her low knock was instantly followed by the opening of the door, for he had been awaiting her coming in torturing suspense.
She could not look at him, but hastily thrusting the packet into his hand, turned weeping away.
He well understood the meaning of her silence and her tears, and with a groan of anguish that Adelaide never could forget, he shut and locked himself in again; while she hurried to her room to indulge her grief in solitude, leaving Mrs. Travilla and Chloe to attend to the last sad offices of love to the dear remains of the little departed one.
The news had quickly spread through the house, and sobs and bitter weeping were heard in every part of it; for Elsie had been dearly loved by all.
Chloe was assisting Mrs. Travilla.
Suddenly the lady paused in her work, saying, in an agitated tone, "Quick! quick! Aunt Chloe, throw open that shutter wide. I thought I felt a little warmth about the heart, and—yes! yes! I was not mistaken; there is a slight quivering of the eyelid. Go, Chloe! call the doctor! she may live yet!"
The doctor was only in the room below, and in a moment was at the bedside, doing all that could be done to fan into a flame that little spark of life.
And they were successful. In a few moments those eyes, which they had thought closed forever to all the beauties of earth, opened again, and a faint, weak voice asked for water.
The doctor was obliged to banish Chloe from the room, lest the noisy manifestation of her joy should injure her nursling, yet trembling upon the very verge of the grave; and as he did so, he cautioned her to refrain from yet communicating the glad tidings to any one, lest some sound of their rejoicing might reach the sick-chamber, and disturb the little sufferer.
And then he and the motherly old lady took their stations at the bedside once more, watching in perfect silence, and administering every few moments a little stimulant, for she was weak as a new-born infant, and only in this way could they keep the flickering flame of life from dying out again.
It was not until more than an hour had passed in this way, and hope began to grow stronger in their breasts, until it became almost certainty that Elsie would live, that they thought of her father and aunt, so entirely had their attention been engrossed by the critical condition of their little patient.
It was many minutes after Adelaide left him ere Mr. Dinsmore could think of anything but the terrible, crushing blow which had fallen upon him, and his agonized feelings found vent in groans of bitter anguish, fit to melt a heart of stone; but at length he grew somewhat calmer; and as his eye fell upon the little packet he remembered that it was her dying gift to him, and with a deep sigh he took it up and opened it.
It contained his wife's miniature—the same that Elsie had always worn suspended from her neck—one of the child's glossy ringlets, severed from her head by her own little hands the day before she was taken ill—and a letter, directed in her handwriting to himself.
He pressed the lock of hair to his lips, then laid it gently down, and opened the letter.
"Dear, dear papa," it began, "my heart is very sad to-night! There is such a weary, aching pain there, that will never be gone till I can lay my head against your breast, and feel your arms folding me tight, and your kisses on my cheek. Ah! papa, how often I wish you could just look down into my heart and see how full of love to you it is! I am always thinking of you, and longing to be with you. You bade me go and see the home you have prepared, and I have obeyed you. You say, if I will only be submissive we will live there, and be so very happy together, and I cannot tell you how my heart longs for such a life with you in that lovely, lovely home; nor how happy I could be there, or anywhere with you, if you would only let me make God's law the rule of my life; but, my own dear father, if I have found your frown so dreadful, so hard to bear, how much more terrible would my Heavenly Father's be! Oh, papa, that would make me wretched indeed! But oh, I cannot bear to think of being sent away from you amongst strangers! Dear, dear papa, will you not spare your little daughter this trial? I will try to be so very good and obedient in everything that my conscience will allow. I am so sad, papa, so very sad, as if something terrible was coming, and my head feels strangely. I fear I am going to be ill, perhaps to die! Oh, papa, will I never see you again? I want to ask you to forgive me for all the naughty thoughts and feelings I have ever had towards you. I think I have never disobeyed you in deed, papa—except the few times you have known of, when I forgot, or thought you bade me break God's law—but twice I have rebelled in my heart. Once when you took Miss Rose's letter from me, and again when mammy told me you had said she must go away. It was only for a little while each time, papa, but it was very wicked, and I am very, very sorry; will you please forgive me? and I will try never to indulge such wicked feelings again."
The paper was blistered with Elsie's tears, and other tears were falling thick and fast upon it now.
"She to ask forgiveness of me, for a momentary feeling of indignation when I so abused my authority," he groaned. "Oh, my darling! I would give all I am worth to bring you back for one hour, that I might ask your forgiveness, on my knees."
But there was more of the letter, and he read on:
"Dear papa," she continued, "should I die, and never see you again in this world, don't ever feel vexed with yourself, and think that you have been too severe with me. I know you have only done what you had a right to do—for am I not your own? Oh, I love to belong to you, papa! and you meant it all to make me good; and I needed it, for I was loving you too dearly. I was getting away from my Saviour. But when you put me away from your arms and separated me from my nurse, I had no one to go to but Jesus, and he drew me closer to him, and I found his love very sweet and precious; it has been all my comfort in my great sorrow. Dear papa, when I am gone, and you feel sad and lonely, will not you go to Jesus, too? I will leave you my dear little Bible, papa. Please read it for Elsie's sake, and God grant it may comfort you as it has your little daughter. And, dear papa, try to forget these sad days of our estrangement, and remember only the time when your little girl was always on your knee, or by your side. Oh! it breaks my heart to think of those sweet times, and that they will never come again! Oh, for one kiss, one caress, one word of love from you! for oh, how I love you, my own dear, be loved, precious papa!
"Your little daughter,
"ELSIE."
Mr. Dinsmore dropped his head upon his hands, and groaned aloud. It was his turn now to long, with an unutterable longing, for one caress, one word of love from those sweet lips that should never speak again. A long time he sat there, living over again in memory every scene in his life in which his child had borne a part, and repenting, oh, so bitterly! of every harsh word he had ever spoken to her, of every act of unjust severity; and, alas! how many and how cruel they seemed to him now! Remorse was eating into his very soul, and he would have given worlds to be able to recall the past.
Chapter