I felt so sorry for him that I could
really say nothing, either to cheer or discourage him. He simply asked
me to allow him to remain my friend, and to forgive his presumption; and
so we shook hands and parted. He did not join the family that evening,
and the next day I left the Merryweathers.
'I do not know how it was, but when I returned home, I thought more of
this young man than of any one else. Although my sister and myself were
surrounded by men of a very different, and I may say, superior class,
still he haunted me very much, for a time at least.
'Then came my sister's marriage, which proved, as you know, unfortunate
in a pecuniary point of view, and her and her husband's emigration to
Australia in search of fortune. Then followed our own ruin, and my
father's paralytic seizure. To help my parents and support myself, I
came to you as governess. You know, dearest Freda, how happy your dear
mother made me as long as she lived, and how ardently I desired to
fulfil her dying wish that I should finish your education. Most thankful
I am that I was permitted to do so.
'I need not tell you, over and over again, the sad story of my mother's
death, and my return home to live with my father, and become a daily
instead of a resident governess.
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