“Alice, darling, are you willing to be left alone for a little while? It won’t be long, and our Father in Heaven knows best what is for our good.”
“Oh, mother, don’t; you will not die,” and Alice sobbed convulsively. “Last night, when I thought you were in danger, I prayed so hard to be willing, but I couldn’t, oh, I couldn’t, and God seemed a great ways off—seemed as if he did not hear. In all the wide world I can never find another mother, and I shall be so desolate.”
Mrs. Johnson knew just how desolate her dying would leave her child, for she had felt the same, and for a few moments she strove to comfort the weeping girl, who hid her face in the pillows, by telling her of One who will surely care for the orphan; for he has said he would, and his word never fails.
“You have learned to trust him in prosperity, and He will be a thousand fold nearer to you in adversity. You’ll miss me, I know, and be very lonely without me, but you are young, and life has many charms for you, besides God will never forget or forsake his covenant children.”
Gradually as she talked the sobbing ceased, and when the white face lifted itself from its hiding place there was a look upon it as if the needed strength had been sought and to some extent imparted.
“My will was made some time ago,” Mrs. Johnson continued, “and that with a few exceptions, such as legacies to your nurse Densie Densmore, and some charitable institutions, you are my sole heir. Mr. Liston is to be your guardian, and will look after your interests until you are of age, or longer if you choose. You know that as both your father and myself were only children, you have no near relatives on either side to whom you can look for protection. There is a kind of second cousin, it is true, the old gentleman who visited us just before we came here. But his family are gay, fashionable people, and I’d rather you should not go there, even if he were willing. Mr. Liston would give you a home with him, but I do not think that best and there is but one other alternative.
“You will remember having heard me speak occasionally of a friend now living in Kentucky, a Mrs. Worthington whose husband was a distant relative of ours. Ralph Worthington and your father were school boys together, and afterward college companions. They were more like brothers than friends; indeed, they were often likened to David and Jonathan, so strongly were they attached to each other.
“I was but sixteen when I became a bride, and, as you know, several years elapsed ere God blessed me with a living child. Your father was consumptive, and the chances were that I should early be left a widow. This it was, I think, which led to the agreement made by the two friends to the effect that if either died the living one should care for the widow and fatherless as for a brother’s family. To see the two as they pledged themselves to keep this solemn compact, you would not have guessed that the tall, athletic, broad chested Ralph, would be the first to go, yet so it was. He died ere you were born.”
“Then he is dead? Oh, I’m so sorry,” Alice exclaimed.
“Yes, he’s dead; and, as far as possible, your father fulfilled his promise to Ralph’s widow and her child—a little boy, five years old, of whom Mrs. Worthington herself was appointed guardian. I never knew what spirit of evil possessed Eliza who had been my schoolmate and to whom I was greatly attached; but in less than a year after her husband’s death, she made a second and most unfortunate marriage. We both opposed it, for we distrusted the man. As the result of our opposition, a coolness sprang up between us, and we saw but little of each other after that. Mr. Murdoch proved a greater scoundrel that we supposed, and when their little girl was nearly two years old, we heard of a divorce. Mr. Johnson’s health was failing fast, and we were about to make the tour of Europe, in hopes a change would benefit him. Just before we sailed we visited poor Eliza, whom we found doubly heart-broken, for, in addition to the other outrages heaped upon her, the brutal wretch had managed to steal her beautiful daughter, and carried it no one knew whither. I never shall forget the distress of the brother. I’ve often thought of him since, and wondered what he had grown to be. We comforted Eliza as best we could, and left money to be used for her in case she needed it. Then we embarked with you and Densie for Europe. You know how for a while, your father seemed to regain his strength, how he at last grew worse and hastened home to die. In the sorrow and excitement which followed, it is not strange that Eliza was for a time forgotten, and when I remembered and enquired for her again, I heard that Hugh had been adopted by some relation in Kentucky, that the stolen child had been mysteriously returned, and was living with its mother in Elmswood—a quiet, out-of-the-way town, which I never visited until that summer when you went West with the Gilmores.