Family Pride; Or, Purified by SufferingHolmes, Mary Jane
General
Family Pride; Or, Purified by Suffering
Holmes, Mary Jane
American fiction; Dime novels
But to whom should she go? To Father Cameron? No, nor to his mother.
They might counsel wrong for the sake of secrecy. Would Mark Ray or Mrs.
Banker know? Perhaps; but they were strangers--her trouble must not be
told to them, and then with a great bound her heart turned at last to
Morris. He knew everything. He would not sanction a wrong. He would tell
her just what was right, and she could trust him fully in everything.
There was no other person whom she could believe just as she could him.
Uncle Ephraim was equally as good and conscientious, but he did not know
as much as Morris--he did not understand everything. Morris was her
refuge, and to him she would go that very day, leaving a note for
Wilford in case she never came back, as possibly she might not. And
then, like an imprisoned bird, which sees its cage door opened at last,
but dreads the freedom offered, Katy drew her bleeding wings close to
her side and shrank from the cold world which lay outside that home of
luxury. But when she remembered that possibly she had no right to stay
there, she grew strong again, and, seizing her pen, dashed off a wild,
impassioned letter, which, if her husband did not find her there on his
return, would tell him where she was and why she had gone. This she left
in a drawer appropriated to Wilford's use, and where he could not fail
to find it; but the picture she put in her own pocket, not caring to
part with that. Had Marian been in the city she would have gone to her
at once, but Marian was where long rows of cots are ranged against the
hospital walls, each holding a maimed and suffering soldier, to whom she
ministered so tenderly, the brightness of her smile and the beauty of
her face deluding the delirious ones into the belief that the journey of
life for them was ended and heaven reached at last, where an angel in
woman's garb attended upon them. Marian was impossible, and Dr. Grant
was the only alternative left.
Summoning Esther, Katy told her, in as calm a voice as she could
command, that, feeling very lonely, she was going out to spend the day,
and probably the night. At all events the servants were not to expect
her until she came.
"Yes, ma'am--going to Mr. Cameron's, I suppose?" Esther said, and as
Katy made no answer the impression in Esther's mind was that she would
spend the day and night at the elder Cameron's, as she had done once
before when Wilford was away.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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