Rhoda could only weep, and return her poor mother's caresses in silence.
Too young and inexperienced to understand the full extent and nature of
this direful calamity, the strange occurrence, the general and apparent
consternation of the whole household, and the spectacle of her mother's
agony, had filled her with fear, perplexity, and anguish. Scared and
stunned with a vague sense of danger, like a young bird that, for the
first time, cowers under a thunderstorm, she nestled in her mother's
bosom; there, with a sense of protection, and of boundless love and
tenderness, she lay frightened, wondering, and weeping.

Two or three days passed, and Dr. Danvers came and sate for several hours
with poor Mrs. Marston. To comfort and console were, of course, out of
his power. The nature of the bereavement, far more terrible than
death--its recent occurrence--the distracting consciousness of all its
complicated consequences--rendered this a hopeless task. She bowed
herself under the blow with the submission of a broken heart. The hope to
which she had clung for years had vanished; the worst that ever her
imagination feared had come in earnest.

One idea was now constantly present in her mind. She felt a sad, but
immovable assurance, that she should not live long, and the thought,
"what will become of my darling when I am gone; who will guard and love
my child when I am in my grave; to whom is she to look for tenderness
and protection then?" perpetually haunted her, and superadded the pangs
of a still wilder despair to the desolation of a broken heart.

It was not for more than a week after this event, that one day
Willett, with a certain air of anxious mystery, entered the silent and
darkened chamber where Mrs. Marston lay. She had a letter in her hand;
the seal and handwriting were Mr. Marston's. It was long before the