The world was coming back to him,--but oh! how
changed!--in the trouble of his daughter's face.
"Darling, what is it? Why are you here? Why are you weeping? Dear child,
the friend of my better days,--of the boyhood when I had noble aims,
and life was beautiful before me,--he has been here! I have seen him.
He has been with me--oh! for a good I cannot tell!"
"Father, dear father!"--he had risen, and sat upon the couch, but she
still knelt before him, weeping, and clasped his hands in hers,--"I
thought of you and of this letter, all the time. All last night till
I slept, and then I dreamed you were tearing it to pieces, and trampling
on it. I awoke, and lay thinking of you, and of ----. And I thought
I heard you come down stairs, and I came here to find you. But you were
lying here so quietly, with your eyes open, and so strange a light on
your face. And I knew,--I knew you were dreaming of him, and that you
saw him, for the letter lay beside you. O father! forgive me, but do
hear me! In the name of this day,--it's Christmas day, father,--in the
name of the time when we must both die,--in the name of that time, father,
hear me! That poor woman last night,--O father! forgive me, but don't
tear that letter in pieces and trample it under foot! You know what
I mean--you know--you know.
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