Volume 2 — FORTY-FIRST PAPER.

MY child looked rosy and happy, and her large eyes were bright. Oh, she is so pretty! I drew her towards me; I raised her in my arms, and placing her on my knees, kissed her dear hair. I asked, “Why is her Mother not with her?” And I learnt that she was very ill, and my poor old mother also.

Mary looked at me with astonishment. Caressed, embraced, devoured with kisses, she submitted quietly; but, from time to time, cast an uneasy look towards her Nurse, who was crying in the corner.

At length I was able to speak.

“Mary,” I exclaimed. “My own little Mary!” and I pressed her violently against my breast, which was heaving with sobs. She uttered a little cry, and then said, “Oh, you hurt me, Sir.”

“Sir!” It is nearly a year since she has seen me, poor child! She has forgotten me, face, words, voice; and then who could know me with this beard, this dress, and this pallor?

What! already effaced from that memory,—the only one where I wished to survive! What! already, no longer a Father, am I condemned to hear no more that word, so soft in the language of children that it cannot remain in the language of men, “Papa”?

And yet to have heard it from that sweet mouth, once more,—only once more,—that is all that I would have asked in payment for the forty years of life they will take from me.

“Listen, Mary,” said I to her, joining her two little hands in mine. “Do you not know me?”

She looked at me with her bright beautiful eyes and answered,—

“Oh, no indeed.”

“Look at me well,” I repeated. “What! dost thou not know who I am?”

“Yes, Sir,” she answered. “You are a gentleman.”

Alas! while loving one being on earth, loving with all your deep affection, having that being before you, who sees and looks at you, speaks and answers you, and yet knows you not! You wish for consolation but from this one being, who is the only one that does not know that you require it because you are going to die!

“Mary,” I continued, “hast thou a papa?”

“Yes, Sir,” said the child.

“Well, then, dearest, where is he?”

She raised her large eyes in astonishment:—

“Ah, then you don’t know, Sir? Papa is dead.”

Here she began to cry: I nearly let the little angel fall.

“Dead!” I exclaimed: “Mary, knowest thou what it is to be dead?”

“Yes, Sir,” she answered. “He is in earth and in Heaven;” and she continued of her own accord, “I pray to God for him morning and evening at mamma’s knees.”

I kissed her on her forehead.

“Mary, say to me thy prayer.”

“I could not, Sir; a prayer you do not say in the middle of the day. Come to-night to my house, and you shall hear me say it.”

This was enough. I interrupted her.

“Darling Mary, it is I who am thy papa.”

“You!” returned she.

I added, “Wouldst thou like me for thy papa?”

The child turned away. “No, Sir; my papa was much prettier.”

I covered her with kisses and tears. She tried to escape from my arms, crying,—

“Sir, you hurt me with your beard.”

Then I replaced her on my knees, devouring her with my eyes, and continued,—

“Mary, canst thou read?”

“Yes,” she answered, “I can read very well. Mamma makes me read my letters.”

“Well, then, read a little to me,” said I, pointing to a printed paper which she held crumpled in one of her dimpled hands.

She shook her pretty head, saying,—

“Oh, dear me! I can only read fables.”

“But try, my darling: come, open your paper.”

She unfolded the paper, and began to spell with her finger, “S E N—sen,—T E N C E—tence,—Sentence.” I snatched it from her hands. It was my own sentence of death she was reading to me!

Her nurse had bought the paper for a penny. To me it had cost more.

No words can convey what I felt; my violence had alarmed the child, who was ready to cry.

Suddenly she said to me,—

“Do give me back my paper; I want to play with it!”

I restored her to her nurse.

“Take her hence!” and I fell back in my chair, gloomy, desolate, in despair! Now they may come: I care for nothing more; the last fibre of my heart is broken.