“Oh no—oh no, darling; you are going to do nothing of the kind,” said Miss Plympton. “I can not let you go. We all love you too dearly. This is your home, and I now stand in the place of those whom you have lost. You are never to leave me, Edith dearest.”
Edith sighed heavily, and shook her head.
“No,” she said, speaking in a low, melancholy voice—“no, I can not stay. I can not meet my friends here again. I am not what I was yesterday. I am changed. It seems as though some heavy weight has come upon me. I must go away, and I have only one place to go to, and that is my father's home.”
“My darling,” said Miss Plympton, drawing her chair close to Edith, and twining her arms about her, “you must not talk so; you can not imagine how you distress me. I can not let you go. Do not think of these things. We all love you. Do not imagine that your secret will be discovered. No one shall ever know it. In a few days you yourself will feel different. The consciousness of your father's innocence will make you feel more patient, and the love of all your friends will make your life as happy as ever.”
“No,” said Edith, “I can not—I can not. You can not imagine how I dread to see the face of any one of them. I shall imagine that they know all; and I can not tell them. They will tease me to tell them my troubles, and it will only worry me. No, for me to stay here is impossible. I would go any where first.”
She spoke so firmly and decisively that Miss Plympton forbore to press her further just then.
“At any rate, my darling,” said she, “you need not think of Dalton Hall. I can find you other places which will be far more suitable to you in every way. If it distresses you to stay here, I can find a happy home for you, where you can stay till you feel able to return to us again.”
“There is no place,” said Edith, “where I can stay. I do not want to go among strangers, or to strange places. I have a home, and that is the only place that I can go to now. That home is familiar to me. I remember it well. It is where I was born. Dear mamma's room is there, where I used to sit with her and hear her voice. My dear papa and mamma were happy there; and she died there. It has its own associations; and now since this great sorrow has come, I long to go there. It seems the fittest place for me.”
“But, my child,” said Miss Plympton, anxiously, “there is one thing that you do not consider. Far be it from me to stand in the way of any of your wishes, especially at a time like this, but is seems to me that a return to Dalton Hall just now is hardly safe.”
“Safe!”