'Shall we have lunch, Miss?'
'Certainly.' So Branston departed.
'Read it with me, Cousin Monica,' I said. And a very curious letter it was.
It spoke as follows:--
'How can I thank my beloved niece for remembering her aged and forlorn
kinsman at such a moment of anguish?'
I had written a note of a few, I dare say, incoherent words by the next
post after my dear father's death.
'It is, however, in the hour of bereavement that we most value the ties
that are broken, and yearn for the sympathy of kindred.'
Here came a little distich of French verse, of which I could only read
_ciel_ and _l'amour_.
'Our quiet household here is clouded with a new sorrow. How inscrutable are
the ways of Providence! I--though a few years younger--how much the more
infirm--how shattered in energy and in mind--how mere a burden--how
entirely _de trop_--am spared to my sad place in a world where I can be no
longer useful, where I have but one business--prayer, but one hope--the
tomb; and he--apparently so robust--the centre of so much good--so
necessary to you--so necessary, alas! to me--is taken! He is gone to his
rest--for us, what remains but to bow our heads, and murmur, "His will be
done"? I trace these lines with a trembling hand, while tears dim my
old eyes.
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