She was glad to find herself alone. Her mother, with her usual
sagacity, had concluded that she would sleep off her troubles as
she often had before, and so left her to herself.
The poor, lost child made some pathetic attempts to put her little
house in order. She destroyed all her letters. She arranged her
drawers with many sudden rushes of tears as various articles called
up memories of earlier and happier days. Among other things she
came across a little birthday present that her father had given
her when she was but six years of age, and she vividly recalled
the happy child she was that day.
"Oh, that I had died then!" she sobbed. "What a wretched failure my
life has been! Never was there a fitter emblem than the imperfect
flower he threw away. I wish I could find the poor, withered, trampled
thing, and that he might find it in my hand with his letter."
She wrote a farewell to her father that was inexpressibly sad, in
which she humbly asked his forgiveness, and entreated him, as her
dying wish, to cease destroying himself with liquor.
"But it is of no use," she moaned. "He has lost hope and courage
like myself, and one can't bear trouble for which there is no
remedy.
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