His body was washed ashore last night. My father
and she heard of it as they came along. Can you bear to see her? She will
not leave him."
"Take me to her," Maggie answered.
They led her into a bed-room. Stretched on the bed lay Edward, but now so
full of hope and worldly plans.
Mrs. Browne looked round, and saw Maggie. She did not get up from her place
by his head; nor did she long avert her gaze from his poor face. But she
held Maggie's hand, as the girl knelt by her, and spoke to her in a hushed
voice, undisturbed by tears. Her miserable heart could not find that
relief.
"He is dead!--he is gone!--he will never come back again! If he had gone to
America--it might have been years first--but he would have come back to me.
But now he will never come back again;--never--never!"
Her voice died away, as the wailings of the night-wind die in the distance;
and there was silence--silence more sad and hopeless than any passionate
words of grief.
And to this day it is the same. She prizes her dead son more than a
thousand living daughters, happy and prosperous as is Maggie now--rich in
the love of many. If Maggie did not show such reverence to her mother's
faithful sorrows, others might wonder at her refusal to be comforted by
that sweet daughter. But Maggie treats her with such tender sympathy, never
thinking of herself or her own claims, that Frank, Erminia, Mr.
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