“Fanny wants nothing from any one else; Fanny wants her brother.”
“Sweet child! I fear she don’t take to me. Will you like me, Miss Fanny?”
“No! get along!”
“Fie, Fanny—you remember you did not take to me at first. But she is so affectionate, ma’am; she never forgets a kindness.”
“I will do all I can to please her, sir. And so she is really master’s grandchild?” The woman fixed her eyes, as she spoke, so intently on Morton, that he felt embarrassed, and busied himself, without answering, in caressing and soothing Fanny, who now seemed to awake to the affliction about to visit her; for though she did not weep—she very rarely wept—her slight frame trembled—her eyes closed—her cheeks, even her lips, were white—and her delicate hands were clasped tightly round the neck of the one about to abandon her to strange breasts.
Morton was greatly moved. “One kiss, Fanny! and do not forget me when we meet again.”
The child pressed her lips to his cheek, but the lips were cold. He put her down gently; she stood mute and passive.
“Remember that he wished me to leave you here,” whispered Morton, using an argument that never failed. “We must obey him; and so—God bless you, Fanny!”
He rose and retreated to the door; the child unclosed her eyes, and gazed at him with a strained, painful, imploring gaze; her lips moved, but she did not speak. Morton could not bear that silent woe. He sought to smile on her consolingly; but the smile would not come. He closed the door, and hurried from the house.
From that day Fanny settled into a kind of dreary, inanimate stupor, which resembled that of the somnambulist whom the magnetiser forgets to waken. Hitherto, with all the eccentricities or deficiencies of her mind, had mingled a wild and airy gaiety. That was vanished. She spoke little—she never played—no toys could lure her—even the poor dog failed to win her notice. If she was told to do anything she stared vacantly and stirred not. She evinced, however, a kind of dumb regard to the old blind man; she would creep to his knees and sit there for hours, seldom answering when he addressed her, but uneasy, anxious, and restless, if he left her.