"Well, Susie, it is useless prolonging our sorrow. I had better say
good-by, and go forever."

"No, no, Frank, dear love. Oh! what am I to do?"

"Be happy, my own, and make me so. Be my wife before I return to W---.
Go with me. Susie, your mother loved me. I know, if here, she would
plead for me."

"Yes, she loved you, and perhaps in her blessed home she will pity me,
and win for me forgiveness, alike from heavenly as earthly father, if
longer my heart cannot resist my love," Susie sobbed, dropping her
golden head on her lover's bosom and promising all he wished.

"The last night at home," she said. "On the morrow I must go forth, to
return no more, the loving, dutiful child. Should he ever consent to
have me come back, I can never be again what I once was to his heart.
I shall have broken the trust he held in me," Susie moaned.

Tenderly the brother and sister were ministered to, her hand resting
on each little head, as their lisping voices followed hers in the
evening prayer. Willie and Emma arose, their demure faces lifted to
receive the good-night kiss. But Rosie, the two-and-a-half-year baby,
the dying mother's sacred charge, wound her tiny arms about the elder
sister, and with baby-like perversity hung on, lisping:

"Now Susu pay, too. _Pease_, Susu. Do!"

The baby plead; and Susie, raising her eyes to Rosie's, felt mother,