They had waited--a vain waiting--for the wearing out of the traces of
the obdurate image; and when they thought they might take placidity as
the sign of what they waited for, they first hinted, and then expressed
in plain terms, the wishes of their hearts. For a time all their efforts
were fruitless; but John Carr getting old and weak, wished to be
succeeded in his business by George; and the wife, when she became a
widow, would require to be maintained--reasons which had more weight
with Effie than any others, excepting always the act of George's
self-immolation at the shrine in which his fancy had placed her. The
importunities at length wore out her resistings, without effacing the
lines of the old and still endeared image, and she gave a cold, we may
say reluctant, consent. The bride's "ay" was a sigh, the rapture a tear
of sadness. But George was pleased even with this: Effie, the
long-cherished Effie, was at length his.
In her new situation, Effie Carr--now Mrs. Lindsay--performed all the
duties of a good and faithful wife; by an effort of the will no doubt,
though in another sense only a sad obedience to necessity, of which we
are all, as the creatures of motives, the very slaves.
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