Mr. Lincoln now came in to see his daughter, but all his attempts to soothe her were in vain. She only replied, "Let me stay at home, here in this room, my own room;" adding more in anger than sorrow, "I'll try to die as soon as I can; and be out of the way, if that's what you want!"
"Oh, Rose, Rose! poor father don't deserve that," said Jenny, raising her hand as if to stay her sister's thoughtless words while Mr Lincoln, laying his face upon the pillow so that his silvered locks mingled with the dark tresses of his child, wept bitterly,—bitterly.
And still he could not tell her why she must leave her home. He would rather bear her unjust reproaches, than have her know that they were beggars; for a sudden shock the physician said, might at any time end her life. Thoroughly selfish as she was, Rose still loved her father dearly, and when she saw him thus moved, and knew that she was the cause, she repented of her hasty words, and laying her long white arm across his neck, asked forgiveness for what she had said.
"I will go to Glenwood," said she; "but must I stay there long?"
"Not long, not long, my child," was the father's reply, and Jenny brushed away a tear as she too thought, "not long."
And so, with the belief that her stay was to be short, Rose passively suffered them to dress her for the journey, which was to be performed partly by railway and partly in a carriage. For the first time since the night of his engagement with Ella Campbell, Henry was this morning free from intoxicating drinks. He had heard them say that Rose must die, but it had seemed to him like an unpleasant dream, from which he now awoke to find it a reality. They had brought her down from her chamber, and laid her upon the sofa in the parlor, where Henry came unexpectedly upon her. He had not seen her for several days, and when he found her lying there so pale and still, her long eyelashes resting heavily upon her colorless cheek, and her small white hands hanging listlessly by her side, he softly approached her thinking her asleep, kissed her brow, cheek and lips, whispering as he did so, "Poor girl! poor Rosa! so young and beautiful."
Rose started, and wiping from her forehead the tear her brother had left there, she looked anxiously around. Henry was gone, but his words had awakened in her mind a new and startling idea. Was she going to die? Did they think so, and was this the reason of Henry's unwonted tenderness? and sinking back upon her pillows, she wept as only those weep to whom, in the full flush of youth and beauty, death comes a dreaded and unwelcome guest.
"I cannot die,—I will not die," said she at last, rousing herself with sudden energy; "I feel that within me which says I shall not die. The air of Glenwood will do me good, and grandma's skill in nursing is wonderful."
Consoled by these reflections, she became more calm, and had her father now given his consent for her to remain in Boston, she would of her own accord have gone to Glenwood.