"Had it ever been her duty to go? She was
leaving her mother alone. She was giving Frank much present sorrow. It was
not even yet too late!" She could not endure longer; and replied to her own
tempting heart.
"I was right to hope for Edward; I am right to give him the chance of
steadiness which my presence will give. I am doing what my mother earnestly
wished me to do; and what to the last she felt relieved by my doing. I know
Frank will feel sorrow, because I myself have such an aching heart; but if
I had asked him whether I was not right in going, he would have been too
truthful not to have said yes. I have tried to do right, and though I may
fail, and evil may seem to arise rather than good out of my endeavor, yet
still I will submit to my failure, and try and say 'God's will be done!' If
only I might have seen Frank once more, and told him all face to face!"
To do away with such thoughts, she determined no longer to sit gazing, and
tempted by the shore; and, giving one look to the land which contained her
lover, she went down below, and busied herself, even through her blinding
tears, in trying to arrange her own cabin, and Edward's. She heard boat
after boat arrive loaded with passengers. She learnt from Edward, who came
down to tell her the fact, that there were upwards of two hundred steerage
passengers. She felt the tremulous shake which announced that the ship was
loosed from her moorings, and being tugged down the river.
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