"Yes, grandpapa, right here in my old place."
He withdrew his hand with an air of pleased satisfaction, and resumed the subject he had just dropped.
"Blanche needs a mother—some female friend to guard and protect her, when—when her old grandfather shall be gone. I am afraid I shall drop off suddenly one of these days; I have sudden turns of illness which are very severe. I was quite sick last night—ah, she told me of your kindness to her, Mr. Wilkins; God be praised—and I could not help feeling then that my thoughts turned more upon my poor desolate child here, than on that other world to which I might be hastening."
Blanche dropped her head lower and lower over her work, till her short glossy ringlets shaded her soft brown eyes.
"This world," continued he, with that love of pursuing the prominent subject of thought so common with aged persons, "has, of course, lost its fascination for me. I am blind, and very old; and am swiftly descending from the summit of life's mount, and must soon drop from its base into that vast eternity of which we know so little. Poor Blanche! I am of course a trouble, so helpless and blind, but she will miss me when she's left alone. Poor child, poor child!"
Blanche lifted up her head quickly, and showed her cheeks wet with streaming tears. She rose from her seat,
took the staff from the old man's hands, and threw herself sobbing aloud upon his bosom.
He folded his aged arms around her and drew her to his heart, while he bent his head, and his white hair, so silvery, floated forward and mingled with the raven blackness of hers. Thus they sat, a touching picture of youth and hoary age, of life's spring-time and the calm tranquillity of its withered autumn.
"Oh, grandpapa!" exclaimed Blanche at last, lifting up her face and looking tearfully into those dim eyes as though they could see all that she wished them. "Never, never talk any more about dying and leaving me here alone, unless you wish to break poor Blanche's heart. You are all that God has left me on this earth to love, and if He takes you, I want to go too. And you said you were a trouble! Don't ever, ever say that again, dear grandfather, if you love me dearly, as I know you do."