Chapter XXXIV

The day was dark and gloomy. Incessant weeping and fasting had brought on one of Ruth’s most violent attacks of nervous headache. Ah! where was the hand which had so lately charmed that pain away? where was the form that, with uplifted finger and tiptoe tread, hushed the slightest sound, excluded the torturing light, changed the heated pillow, and bathed the aching temples? Poor Ruth! nature had been tasked its utmost with sad memories and weary vigils, and she sank fainting to the floor.

Well might the frightened children huddle breathless in the farther corner. The coffin, the shroud, and the grave, were all too fresh in their childish memory. Well might the tearful prayer go up to the only Friend they knew,—“Please God, don’t take away our mamma, too.”

Ruth heard it not; well had she never woke, but the bitter cup was not yet drained.

“Good morning, Ruth,” said her father, (a few hours after,) frowning slightly as Ruth’s pale face, and the swollen eyes of her children, met his view. “Sick?”

“One of my bad headaches,” replied Ruth, with a quivering lip.

“Well, that comes of excitement; you shouldn’t get excited. I never allow myself to worry about what can’t be helped; this is the hand of God, and you ought to see it. I came to bring you good news. The doctor has very generously offered to take both your children and support them. It will be a great burden off your hands; all he asks in return is, that he shall have the entire control of them, and that you keep away. It is a great thing, Ruth, and what I didn’t expect of the doctor, knowing his avaricious habits. Now you’ll have something pleasant to think about, getting their things ready to go; the sooner you do it the better. How soon, think?”

“I can never part with my children,” replied Ruth, in a voice which, though low, was perfectly clear and distinct.

“Perfect madness,” said her father, rising and pacing the floor; “they will have a good home, enough to eat, drink, and wear, and be taught—”

“To disrespect their mother,” said Ruth, in the same clear, low tone.

“Pshaw,” said her father impatiently; “do you mean to let such a trifle as that stand in the way of their bread and butter? I’m poor, Ruth, or at least I may be to-morrow, who knows? so you must not depend on me; I want you to consider that, before you refuse. Perhaps you expect to support them yourself; you can’t do it, that’s clear, and if you should refuse the doctor’s offer, and then die and leave them, he wouldn’t take them.”

“Their Father in Heaven will,” said Ruth. “He says, ‘Leave thy fatherless children with me.’”

“Perversion of Scripture, perversion of Scripture,” said Mr. Ellet, foiled with his own weapons.

Ruth replied only with her tears, and a kiss on each little head, which had nestled up to her with an indistinct idea that she needed sympathy.

“It is of no use getting up a scene, it won’t move me, Ruth,” said Mr. Ellet, irritated by the sight of the weeping group before him, and the faint twinges of his own conscience; “the doctor must take the children, there’s nothing else left.”

“Father,” said Ruth, rising from her couch and standing before him; “my children are all I have left to love; in pity do not distress me by urging what I can never grant.”

“As you make your bed, so lie in it,” said Mr. Ellet, buttoning up his coat, and turning his back upon his daughter.

It was a sight to move the stoutest heart to see Ruth that night, kneeling by the side of those sleeping children, with upturned eyes, and clasped hands of entreaty, and lips from which no sound issued, though her heart was quivering with agony; and yet a pitying Eye looked down upon those orphaned sleepers, a pitying Ear bent low to list to the widow’s voiceless prayer.