"Hush! and sit down, will you? yes, a whole package of letters for you. Well, thought I, Mrs. Van has no right to that, anyhow, and she ain't agoing to take the care of it any more; so I just took it up and put it in the bosom of my frock while I looked to see if there was any more for you, but there warn't. There it is!"
And she tossed the package into Ellen's lap. Ellen's head swam.
"Well, good-bye!" said Nancy, rising; "I may go now, I suppose, and no thanks to me."
"Yes, I do I do thank you very much, Nancy!" cried Ellen, starting up and taking her by the hand "I do thank you though it wasn't right; but oh! how could she! how could she!"
"Dear me!" said Nancy; "to ask that of Mrs. Van! she could do anything. Why she did it ain't so easy to tell."
Ellen, bewildered, scarcely knew, only felt, that Nancy had gone. The outer cover of her package, the seal of which was broken, contained three letters; two addressed to Ellen, in her father's hand, the third to another person. The seals of these had not been broken. The first that Ellen opened she saw was all in the same hand with the direction; she threw it down and eagerly tried the other. And yes! there was indeed the beloved character of which she never thought to have seen another specimen. Ellen's heart swelled with many feelings; thankfulness, tenderness, joy, and sorrow, past and present that letter was not thrown down, but grasped, while tears fell much too fast for eyes to do their work. It was long before she could get far in the letter. But when she had fairly begun it she went on swiftly, and almost breathlessly, to the end.
"MY DEAR, DEAR LITTLE ELLEN,
"I am scarcely able but I must write to you once more. Once more, daughter, for it is not permitted me to see your face again in this world. I look to see it, my dear child, where it will be fairer than ever here it seemed, even to me. I shall die in this hope and expectation. Ellen, remember it. Your last letters have greatly encouraged and rejoiced me. I am comforted, and can leave you quietly in that hand that has led me, and I believe is leading you. God bless you, my child!
"Ellen, I have a mother living, and she wishes to receive you as her own when I am gone. It is best you should know at once why I never spoke to you of her. After your aunt Bessy married and went to New York, it displeased and grieved my mother greatly that I too, who had always been her favourite child, should leave her for an American home. And when I persisted, in spite of all that entreaties and authority could urge, she said she forgave me for destroying all her prospects of happiness, but that after I should be married and gone, she should consider me as lost to her entirely, and so I must consider myself. She never wrote to me, and I never wrote to her after I reached America. She was dead to me. I do not say that I did not deserve it.
"But I have written to her lately, and she has written to me. She permits me to die in the joy of being entirely forgiven, and in the further joy of knowing that the only source of care I had left is done away. She will take you to her heart, to the place I once filled, and I believe fill yet. She longs to have you, and to have you as entirely her own, in all respects; and to this, in consideration of the wandering life your father leads, and will lead, I am willing and he is willing to agree. It is arranged so. The old happy home of my childhood will be yours, my Ellen. It joys me to think of it. Your father will write to your aunt and to you on the subject, and furnish you with funds. It is our desire that you should take advantage of the very first opportunity of proper persons going to Scotland, who will be willing to take charge of you. Your dear friends, Mr. and Miss Humphreys, will, I dare say, help you in this.