d not feel
an ache in the lame leg: you could not keep up with me; you know you
could not. So think over the cottage and the basket-work, and practise
at samplers and pincushions, when it is too hot to play; and be stout
and strong against I come back. That, I trust, will be this day week,
---'t is but seven days; and then we will only act fairy dramas to
nodding trees, with linnets for the orchestra; and even Sir Isaac shall
not be demeaned by mercenary tricks, but shall employ his arithmetical
talents in casting up the weekly bills, and he shall never stand on his
hind legs except on sunny days, when he shall carry a parasol to shade
an enchanted princess. Laugh; darling,--let me fancy I see you laughing;
but don't fret,--don't fancy I desert you. Do try and get well,--quite,
quite well; I ask it of you on my knees."

The letter and the bag were taken over at sunrise to Mr. Hartopp's
villa. Mr. Hartopp was an early man. Sophy overslept herself: her room
was to the west; the morning beams did not reach its windows; and the
cottage without children woke up to labour noiseless and still. So when
at last she shook off sleep, and tossing her hair from her blue eyes,
looked round and became conscious of the strange place, she still
fancied the hour early. But she got up, drew the curtain from the
window, saw the sun high in the heavens, and, ashamed of her laziness,
turned, and lo! the letter on the chair! Her heart at once misgave her;
the truth flashed upon a reason prematurely quick in the intuition which
belongs to the union of sensitive affection and active thought. She drew
a long breath, and turned deadly pale. It was some minutes before she
could take up the letter, before she could break the seal. When she
did, she read on noiselessly, her tears dropping over the page, without
effort or sob. She had no egotistical sorrow, no grief in being
left alone with strangers: it was the pathos of the old man's lonely
wanderings, of his bereavement, of his counterfeit glee, and genuine
self-sacrifice; this it was that suffused her whole heart with
unutterable yearnings of tenderness, gratitude, pity, veneration. But
when she had wept silently for some time, she kissed the letter with
devout passion, and turned to that Heaven to which the outcast had
taught her first to pray.

Afterwards she stood still, musing a little while, and the sorrowful
shade gradually left her face. Yes; she would obey him: she would not
fret; she w