Not a word was spoken. But the swell and beat of that aged mother’s heart brought back true life into the cold bosom of the daughter.
“Mother!” she said, lifting up her two palms and smoothing down the gray hair on each side of that wrinkled forehead. “Mother, how white your hair has grown.”
“Thank God!” cried the aged husband, as he saw this. And in the flood of tender joy, through which these words were spoken, he lifted his clasped hands to heaven.
The sound, tender and holy as it was, drove that poor creature back into her insanity. She turned from her mother, looked coldly upon the old man, and then, with a faint shake of the head, walked into the house again.
“Come,” said the old man, tenderly, to his wife, “let us wait God’s time. It is something that she has known you for a minute!”
“Something,” repeated the old lady, overwhelmed with gratitude; “John, it has given me new life.”
Hand-in-hand, full of holy faith, and beautiful in the deep love of their old age, they followed Catharine and her charge into the family sitting-room.
“Sit down here, my daughter, while I take off your bonnet and shawl,” said the old lady, wheeling an easy-chair to the window.
Elsie sat down in silence and gazed wistfully in her mother’s face, as the aged parent removed the bonnet from her head, that poor head whose ever burning heat had scattered those long black tresses so heavily with snow.
“See,” said the woman, trembling beneath the joy of that look, “there is the old pear-tree yet, white with blossoms. I am sure we might find half a dozen robins’ nests in the boughs, if you were only young enough to climb them, Elsie.”