"There is another world
For all that live and move,—a better world."
If we ever find a path which seems about to lead us up to these mysteries, it speedily closes against us, and leaves us without any rational hope of attaining their solution.
MY OWN STORY.
"Oh, tell her, brief is life, but love is long."
"What have I got that you would like to have? Your letters are tied up and directed to you. Mother will give them to you, when she finds them in my desk. I could execute my last will myself, if it were not for giving her additional pain. I will leave everything for her to do except this: take these letters, and when I am dead, give them to Frank. There is not a reproach in them, and they are full of wit; but he won't laugh, when he reads them again. Choose now, what will you have of mine?"
"Well," I said, "give me the gold pen-holder that Redmond sent you after he went away."
Laura rose up in her bed, and seized me by my shoulder, and shook me, crying between her teeth, "You love him! you love him!" Then she fell back on her pillow. "Oh, if he were here now! He went, I say, to marry the woman he was engaged to before he saw you. He was nearly mad, though, when he went. The night mother gave them their last party, when you wore your black lace dress, and had pink roses in your hair, somehow I hardly knew you that night. I was in the little parlor, looking at the flowers on the mantelpiece, when Redmond came into the room, and, rushing up to me, bent down and whispered, 'Did you see her go? I shall see her no more; she is walking on the beach with Maurice.' He sighed so loud that I felt embarrassed; for I was afraid that Harry Lothrop, who was laughing and talking in a corner with two or three men, would hear him; but he was not aware that they were there. I did not know what to do, unless I ridiculed him. 'Follow them,' I said. 'Step on her flounces, and Maurice will have a chance to humiliate you with some of his cutting, exquisite politeness.' He never answered a word, and I would not look at him, but presently I understood that there were tears falling. Oh, you need not look towards me with such longing; he does not cry for you now. They seemed to bring him to his senses. He stamped his foot; but the carpet was thick; it only made a thud. Then he buttoned his coat, giving himself a violent twist as he did it, and looked at me with such a haughty composure, that, if I had been you, I should have trembled in my shoes. He walked across the room toward the group of men.—'Ah, Harry,' he said, 'where is Maurice?' 'Don't you know?' they all cried out; 'he has gone as Miss Denham's escort?' 'By Jove!' said Harry Lothrop,—'Miss Denham was as handsome as Cleopatra, to-night. Little Maurice is now singing to her. Did he take his guitar under his arm? It was here; for I saw a green bag near his hat, when we came in to-night.' Just then we heard the twang of a guitar under the window, and Redmond, in spite of himself, could not help a grimace.—Is it not a droll world?" said Laura, after a pause; "things come about so contrariwise."
She laughed such a shrill laugh, that I shuddered to hear it, and I fell a-crying. "But," she continued, "I am going, I trust, where a key will be given me for this cipher."
Tears came into her eyes, and an expression of gentleness filled her face.
"It is strange," she said, "when I know that I must die, that I should be so moved by earthly passions and so interested in earthly speculations. My heart supplicates God for peace and patience, and at the same moment my thoughts float away in dreams of the past. I shall soon be wiser; I am convinced of that. The doctrine of compensation extends beyond this world; if it be not so, why should I die at twenty, with all this mysterious suffering of soul? You must not wonder over me, when I am gone, and ask yourself, 'Why did she live?' Believe that I shall know why I lived, and let it suffice you and encourage you to go on bravely. Live and make your powers felt. Your nature is affluent, and you may yet learn how to be happy."