CHAPTER 6.
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A few days more elapsed, when, one afternoon, Mr. Waverly met as he was entering his house, a girl who had lived in his family for some time previous to the sad event that has been mentioned. In the breaking up of his household, she had left him.
"Alice! How do you do?" said Mr. Waverly, evincing pleasure at the sight of his former servant.
"I'm very well," replied the girl, respectfully.
"You've called to see the children?"
"Yes sir. I've been wanting to see them for a good while. How Ada has grown."
"Yes; she's grown a good deal."
"Dear little thing! Her face is as sweet as ever!"
"Did she know you?" asked Mr. Waverly.
"Oh, yes, indeed, sir!" replied the girl, quickly, and with animation. "And was so glad to see me that she cried."
An involuntary sigh disturbed the bosom of Mr. Waverly, and he was, for a moment, silent; while the girl remained standing before him as if waiting for him to say something further.
"Where are you living now?" he at length inquired.
"I've been living at the Mansion House in Third Street for some time past; but left there a few days ago."
"Then you are out of a place?"
"Yes sir."
There was another pause.
"Have you a place in view?" was further inquired. "No, sir."
"How would you like to come and live in my family again?"
"In what capacity?"
"To have charge of Ada and Herbert."
"You have a nurse."
"Yes, but I'm going to part with her. The fact is, I'm afraid she's not over kind to the children; and that will never suit me."
"Not kind to them!" There was a tone of well affected indignation in the girl's voice. "How could anyone be unkind to Ada! And, as for Herbert, he was always a good child."
"Some people are so cruel by nature, that oppression of the weak gives them delight. Such a person I have good reason to believe Phoebe to be; and therefore, she will leave here tomorrow. Now how would you like to come and take her place?"
"If she is really going away, and you would like me to come, I shall be very well satisfied to get back again into your family. I always liked the children."
A close observer would readily have detected, in the exterior calmness of the girl, signs of a smothered excitement.
"Then I would like you to come tomorrow afternoon, Alice; if that will suit you," said Mr. Waverly.
"That will suit me as well as any other time," was answered. And, as Alice spoke, she turned herself partly away, as if to conceal the expression of her face.
"You will be here then?"
"Oh, yes," replied the girl. "You may depend on me."
"Very well. I shall expect you."
"I'm fortunate in that arrangement," said Mr. Waverly to himself, as he parted with the girl. "I always liked Alice, and can trust her with the children, and feel perfectly at ease in my mind."
"Oh, Papa! Alice has been here," exclaimed Herbert, as soon as Mr. Waverly entered the room where his children were sitting with their aunt. "You know Alice that used to live with us."
"Yes, I saw her as I came in," replied the father.
"I wish she would come back again. I always liked her," continued the boy. "And I don't like Phoebe a bit. She's so cross."
"Alice would be quite as cross as Phoebe, if you worried her as much," said Edith, in a severe tone. "I think she has a good deal of patience with you. More than I have."
In this last sentence, Edith spoke the truth.
Mr. Waverly had his own thoughts, but he did not express them.
Ada, who as soon as her father had taken a chair, came and climbed into his lap, was already leaning her head against his bosom, and looking up, with her pensive eyes, earnestly into his face.
"Would you like Alice to come back?" inquired Mr. Waverly, in a low, fond voice.
"Yes," whispered Ada.
"Shall I tell her to come back?"
"Yes," and a light came into the child's countenance.
"Very well. She shall come tomorrow."
"Is Phoebe going away?"
The child still spoke in a whisper.
"Yes," replied Mr. Waverly.
"Oh, I'm so glad!"
A smile played, for a moment, around Ada's lips. Then she glanced up, with a more earnest look into her father's face, and whispered, "Won't mamma come back too?"
Mr. Waverly gave an involuntary startle, at this unexpected question. The child saw, by the sudden change in her father's countenance, that she had done something wrong. A little while she looked at him, half fearfully, and then withdrew her eyes from his face; shrinking closer upon his bosom as she did so.
For some time Mr. Waverly remained silent, then rising, with Ada in his arms, he went up to his chamber. Closing the door behind him, he sat down, and again let his child rest upon his knee. "Ada, dear," said he, in a low, earnest voice.
The child looked up eagerly.
"Ada, dear, I want you to remember what I am going to say to you."
The manner of Mr. Waverly, so serious and so expressive, seemed to half frighten the child. But she did not withdraw her eyes from those of her father.
"Ada, you have no mamma." This was said very solemnly.
The child looked bewildered.
"But I saw her, papa. Did not you see her out at Laurel Hill?" This was said by Ada after a moment or two. "She was not under the ground like dear little Eda. She's alive. Why don't you bring her home? We'll all love her so!"
The child's eyes shone bright through gathering tears, as she thus plead for her mother.
"The woman you saw, at Laurel Hill is no longer your mamma," said Mr. Waverly.
"Oh, yes! That was mamma!" persisted Ada, with a beautiful and expressive earnestness. "I wish she would come home. I cry so for her, papa, when no one sees me. Aunt Edith scolds me, and says I'm cross when I'm only crying for mamma. But I don't let her see me cry now. You won't scold me; will you, papa?"
Tears were flowing over the cheeks of the child as she said this.
It was impossible for Mr. Waverly to resist the impulse that seized him. He drew this grieving little one to his bosom with a grasp that was almost convulsive.
"Lord, help us to bear this great affliction," came, with a groan, from his lips, as he lifted his eyes upwards. "Poor human nature is too weak for the trial!"
"Don't cry, papa," said Ada. The pain of the father's heart was too great for him to bear without still further outward expression. The words he had just uttered died in sobs upon his lips.
"Don't cry, papa," said Ada, startled by so unusual an exhibition in her parent. And as she spoke, her own tears were dried up, "Mamma will come home. She is not dead, like poor little Eda."
"No, my love," returned Mr. Waverly, regaining his self-possession, and speaking firmly. "Mamma will never come home any more. Ada has no mamma. She is gone."
"Where has she gone, papa? Can't you send for her and tell her to come back."
"No, dear. She will never come back any more. And you must try and forget her. Aunt Edith will be your mamma."
"I don't want her for a mamma. I want my own mamma," said Ada, again bursting into tears and sobbing bitterly.
What further to say, the unhappy man did not know. He felt that he had failed entirely to make the desired impression on the mind of Ada, whose heart was yearning for her mother.
"Oh wretched woman!" he murmured to himself. "For what untold wrongs are you now responsible! Where was your love for your children when you so madly stepped aside from virtue? Your regard for a husband, who would have sacrificed even life itself for your sake? Can repentance and suffering ever atone for your crime!"
As Mr. Waverly said this, the image of the poor offcast, as she sat crouching beside the grave of their last born, came up vividly before him, and his heart softened towards her with an emotion of pity.
"Unhappy woman! Why did not the grave open for you, before your feet wandered! Dear would your memory now have been. I could have stood on the fragrant turf, beneath which moldered your body, and, pointing upward, said to these little ones, 'Your mother is in Heaven.' Even though sad of heart, hope would have mingled with my sorrow. Alas! what hope is there now?"
No further did Mr. Waverly seek to effect his purpose of removing from Ada's mind the thought of her mother. He saw how vain was the task, and abandoned it in despair. Soon after, he carried her down in his arms and joined his sister and Herbert at the tea table. The evening meal passed silent and cheerless; and, after it was ended, the children were taken to bed, and Mr. Waverly and his sister each retired to be alone. How dark was the shadow that brooded over that household!
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