filled with an alien family; yet, perhaps, by and by, taking them into amity, watching over them as she had done over her own, in that sweetness of self-forgetfulness and tender love of humankind which is the atmosphere of the blessed. All through this spiritual being was to me a beatified shadow of Charlotte. I felt that this was what she might be capable of doing, if it were possible that those whom she loved most were no longer dependent upon her care.
{157}
{158}
{159}
You will say all this was very fantastic,{160} and I do not deny that the sentence is just.
{160}
Next day passed in something the same way. Charlotte was very anxious. She had wished the removal to take place that afternoon, but when the moment came she was afraid. She said “To-morrow,” with a shiver. “I don’t know what I am afraid of,” she said, “but my heart fails me—my heart fails me.” I had to telegraph to Charley that it was deferred, and another long day went by. It rained, and that was an obstacle. “I cannot take him away in bad weather,” she said. She came downstairs to me a dozen times a day, wringing her hands. “I have no resolution,” she cried. “I cannot—I cannot make up my mind to it. I feel that something dreadful is going to happen.” I could only take her trembling hand and try to comfort her. “But if it must be done,” I ventured to say, “you will be happier when it is over.” She gave me a wild{161} look of panic. “I don’t know what I am afraid of,” she said. “I wish it might be taken out of my hands.” I understood her, and I made all the arrangements.
{161}
Next day, at noon, was to be the time. I ordered a carriage from the nearest town, not without feeling the risk that the old man might perceive it was not his own, and inquire into the meaning of it. Every step of the way was beset by risks; but still, if it had to be done—“if ’twere done when ’tis done, then it were well it were done quickly.” Those words had haunted me before. I settled everything. I made her come out with me to get a little air in the afternoon. “You are killing yourself,” I said. “It is this that makes you so nervous and unlike yourself.” She consented, though it was against her will. A woman who had been all her life in their service, who was to go with them, whom Charlotte treated, as she said, “like one of ourselves,” had charge of Mr.{162} Campbell in the meantime. And I think Charlotte got a little pleasure
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