"And yours to him whom I believed my father, had the same effect on me. How strange it was, that then I felt as if I would give worlds to call you father, instead of the wretched being I had just quitted."
"Then you are willing to acknowledge me, my beloved, my lovely daughter," said he, pressing a father's kiss on my forehead, from which his hand fondly put back the clustering locks. "My daughter! let me repeat the name. My daughter! how sweet, how holy it sounds! Had she lived, or had she only known before she died, the constancy and purity of my love; but forgive me, thou Almighty chastener of man's erring heart! I dare not murmur. She knows all this now. She has given me her divine forgiveness."
"She left it with me, father, to give you; not only her forgiveness, but her undying love, and her dying blessing."
Withdrawing the arm with which he still embraced me, he bowed his face on his hands, and I hardly dared to breathe lest I should disturb the sacredness of his emotions. "She knows all this now." My heart repeated the words. Methought the wings of her spirit were hovering round us,—her husband and her child,—whom the hand of God had brought together after years of alienation and sorrow. And other thoughts pressed down upon me. By and by, when we were all united in that world, where we should know even as we are known, Ernest would read my heart, by the light of eternity, and then he would know how I loved him. There would be no more suspicion, or jealousy, or estrangement, but perfect love and perfect joy would absorb the memory of sorrow.
"And you are married, my Gabriella?" were the first words my father said, when he again turned towards me. "How difficult to realize; and you looking so very young. Young as you really are, you cheat the eye of several years of youth!"
"I was very ill, and when I woke to consciousness, I found myself shorn of the glory of womanhood,—my long hair."
"You are so like my Rosalie. Your face, your eyes, your smile; and I feel that you have her pure and loving heart. Heaven preserve it from the blight that fell on hers!"
The smile faded from my lip, and a quick sigh that I could not repress saddened its expression. The eyes of my father were bent anxiously on me.
"I long to see the husband of my child," said he. "Is he not with you?"
"No, my father, he is far away. Do not speak of him now, I can only think of you."