The parting of Charley with his wife every morning ere he went to business, was of the most tender description.
He thought, and with sufficient reason, that perhaps he might never see her alive again; and, it must be confessed, as he leaned over her to say good morning, his eyes were moist as she passionately kissed him.
“Don’t weep, Charley dear,” poor Clara would say, as she passed her thin, white, delicate arms around his neck in unaffected simplicity and affection.
“There, don’t, don’t weep, my good, good, boy, or you will make me worse, darling; there, smile. Oh, how different you look, pet; what a shame it is that you look so solemn. There, go away smiling, and it will make me happy all the day,” she would laughingly add as he bestowed a parting embrace and departed.
While Charley was full of business, one morning at the office—but, it must be confessed, in a very disturbed state of mind—a messenger arrived, saying, “He was wanted at home immediately, his wife was dying!”
If a shot had struck him he could not have felt more pain and alarm.
He seized his hat, and ran down to the ferry-boat like a maniac.
He had to wait fifteen minutes before the boat started.
It was unearthly torture to him.
He could plainly see his house, on the south side of the river, which appeared to be no more than a few hundred yards distant.