Chapter 22

How the hearts of the mother and her two oldest children trembled with hope and fear! A marked change was apparent in Mr. Ellis when he came home with Kate. He was sober, and very serious, but said nothing; and Mrs. Ellis deemed it prudent to say nothing to him.

On the next morning, he did not rise early. Henry had eaten his breakfast and was away to his work, and Kate had gone to market to get something for dinner, when he got up and dressed himself. Mrs. Ellis was ready for him with a good cup of coffee, a piece of hot toast, some broiled steak, and a couple of eggs. She said little, but her tones were subdued and very kind. Noticing that his hand trembled so that he spilled his coffee in raising his cup to his lips, (his custom was to get a glass of liquor before breakfast to steady his nerves,) she came and stood beside him, saying, as she did so--"Let me hold your cup for you."

Ellis acquiesced; and so his wife held the cup to his lips while he drank.

"Oh, dear! This is a dreadful state to be in Cara!"

The exclamation was spontaneous. Had Ellis thought a moment, his pride would have caused him to repress it.

Mrs. Ellis did not reply, for she was afraid to trust herself to speak, lest her words or voice should express something that would check the better feelings that were in the heart of her husband. But, ere she could repress it, a tear fell upon his hand. Almost with a start, Ellis turned and looked up into her face. It was calm, yet sorrowful. The pale and wasted condition of that face had never so struck him before.

"Ah, Cara," said he, dropping his knife and fork, "it is dreadful to live in this way. Dreadful! dreadful!"

The poor, almost heart-broken wife could command herself no longer; and she laid her face down upon her husband and sobbed--the more convulsively from her efforts to regain self-possession.

"Oh, Henry!" she at length murmured, "if the past were only ours! If we could but live over our lives, with some of the experience that living gives, how differently should we act! But, surely, hope is not clean gone for ever! Is there not yet a better and a brighter day for even us?"

"There is, Cara! There is!" replied Ellis, in tones of confidence. "It has been a long, long night, Cara; a cold and cheerless night. But the morning breaks. There is not much strength left in this poor arm," and he extended his right hand, that trembled like an aspen leaf--"but it can yet do something. It shall not be with us as it has been any longer. In the sight of Heaven, and in the hope of strength from above, I promise that, Cara. Will you help me to keep my promise?"

"Yes--yes--yes," was the emphatic response. "If there is in me a particle of strength, it is yours, and you may lean on it confidently. Oh, Henry! trust in me. The