“Then,” said Frances, “I can have no hesitation in making my offer. I will sell this place to you for what you gave for it. Secure the sum to me outright, and I renounce my title to Clyde Farm. Make it, if you please, wholly a manufacturing place; do not consult me whether there shall be rail-roads or mills.”
“Upon my word,” said Mr. Draper, “with an estate like mine, I should be mortified to make such a paltry purchase of my wife. It is for you and our only child that I am accumulating a fortune. Have you ever found me sordid or tenacious of money, that you wish a certain sum secured to you?”
“Never,” said she with emotion; “all that money can purchase, you have been most liberal in procuring me. Would that you were as generous to yourself!”
“We all have our own ideas of happiness,” said Mr. Draper; “but since it is your wish, Frances, I will close with your proposal, and secure to you twenty thousand dollars, which is a little more than I paid for Clyde Farm. Legal instruments shall be immediately drawn up; and to convince you that I wish for no control over that sum, I will have it put in trust.”
“Let the instrument be so worded,” said Frances, “that it shall revert to our child at my death.”
“As you please,” said Mr. Draper, coldly; “it is all the same to me.”
CHAPTER V.—CONCLUSION.
From this time, Clyde Farm became wholly a place of business. No regard was now paid to the beauty of the place. Iron-manufactories, nail-manufactories, and saw-mills, were projected, and all was hurry and bustle. One more pang, however, remained for Frances. The sequestered nook she had selected, where her little Charlotte’s remains were deposited,—that spot, so still, so tranquil, so shaded by trees, and so sheltered by valleys, so removed apparently from the tumult of business,—over that very spot, it was found necessary for the rail-road to pass! Strange as it may seem, the worldly father appeared to feel more deeply this innovation than the mother.
Twice he repaired to the spot to give his directions for the removal of the remains, and twice an impetuous burst of sorrow drove him from it.
“It is only a temporary resting-place, even for the body,” said Frances; “the spirit is not there.” She looked calmly on, and gave those directions for which the father was unable.