Mortal ever heard;
Listen rapt and silent when he sings.
Do not seek to see,
Lest the vision be,
But a flutter of departing wings.”
I had no fear of such a fleeting joy. I knew that my vocation was found. I had received the call, and having done so, I was sure my work would be assigned me. Of some things we feel quite certain. Inside there is a click, a kind of bell that strikes, when the hands of our destiny meet at the meridian hour. I cannot make it plainer, those who have experienced it, will know. I only hope that every new writer may enter the gates of the literary life, as happily and hopefully as I did.
It was near midnight when we went to bed. Our little affairs were so full of interest to us. This thirty dollars would remove us into the city, but though we were both very anxious to go at once, we decided that it would be better to remain in the country until September brought cooler weather. Alice was exceedingly frail, and she was the first consideration. Also, I would have to go to New York to find the proper place to live in and rent unfurnished rooms there; and this looked to me a rather formidable undertaking. I had never heard of real estate offices, and whether they existed at this date, or not, I do not know. But we read the advertisements in the Herald, and I made a note of several locations. As to the healthiness, or respectability of these locations, the rents and half a dozen other important questions, we knew absolutely nothing. I smile to myself yet, at the childlike confidence, with which I essayed this plunge into the unknown.
And as we talked, full of gratitude and hope, I was able to give up cheerfully my last fort of pride or vanity, and I promised myself to write immediately to Mr. Beecher. It was my proper share of the obligation attending this new move in life. In the midst of conversation on this topic, the clock struck twelve, and Lilly said,
“Mamma, you ate no supper. You are hungry, or you ought to be. I am going to bring something to eat upstairs.”