For the week preceding the arrival of the raft, Emily Goodridge had been improving in health, though she was still quite feeble. She sat up part of the day, and spent an hour or two in the forenoon in the open air. As we approached the city, the excitement of being so near home buoyed her up, and seemed to give her an unnatural strength.
For my own part, I was in a whirl of excitement. The end of the voyage was a tremendous event in itself; but, as I thought of the astonishment of my brother when he should see Flora and me, and of the meeting between Mr. Goodridge and his daughter, I could hardly contain myself. The sights along the river, too, were sufficiently wonderful to keep my eyes wide open, and my heart leaping. For the first time in my life I saw a ship—hundreds of them, whose forest of masts and spars was as strange to me as though I had been transported to the centre of the Celestial Empire.
It seemed to me an age since I had left Torrentville; since, with bounding bosom, I had guided the raft down the creek to the Wisconsin. The events which had preceded our departure appeared to have occurred years ago, and to be dwarfed into littleness by the lapse of time. Captain Fishley, his wife, and Ham seemed almost like myths, so far removed were they from me by distance and time. I had almost forgotten that I had been charged with a base crime, and that I had fled to escape unpleasant consequences.
There was the great city of New Orleans spread out before me; and there, somewhere in the midst of its vast mass of heaving life, was my brother, and Flora's brother. I knew not where to look for him. But my first duty was to the poor girl, sick in body and sick at heart, who had voyaged down the river with us; who had made us feel enough of Christ's spirit to know that "it is more blessed to give than to receive."
Emily was in the chamber with Flora when Sim and I fastened the raft to the post. My fellow-laborer had already indulged in unnumbered "Hookies," and his eyes were set wide open by the wonders that surrounded us. I left him to stare, and to be stared at by the idlers on shore, and went into the house.
"Our journey is ended!" I exclaimed.
"And I am close to my father's house," added Emily, with convulsive emotion.
As I looked into her pale face, I could not help fearing that she was close to her Father's house in a higher sense than she meant the words—close to that "house of many mansions, eternal in the heavens;" for she seemed to have, in her weakness, but little hold upon this life.
"Where does your father live, Emily?" I asked.
"In Claiborne Street," she replied. "If you could get a carriage, I would like to go there at once."