Year after
year passed away. I still remained with my father and mother; and I felt
no wish to leave them, although I had more than one opportunity for so
doing. My mother died at the age of sixty-five. I nursed her tenderly
through a long and painful illness, and closed her eyes in death. My
father and I were now left alone in our home. He was several years older
than my mother. The infirmities of age were coming fast upon him."
CHAPTER XVII.
PENITENT, AND FORGIVEN.
On a stormy evening, like this, we were sitting together in this room
when our attention was arrested by a timid knock at the door. My father
opened the door, and I heard some one, in a feeble voice, ask permission
to enter the house. My father conducted the stranger in, and gave him a
seat by our cheerful fire. When the stranger entered the room, and I
gained a view of his face, I at once knew that I stood face to face with
George Almont. When I suddenly pronounced his name, my father made a
hasty movement as if to speak with anger, but I gave him an imploring
look and he remained silent. Although greatly changed, it was,
nevertheless, George Almont who was now in our presence. After a few
moments of silence, for after my exclamatory utterance of his name,
neither of us had spoken, he turned his eyes, in which the light of
disease painfully burned, and said,--'You do well not to reproach me;
the time for that is past, for I am, as you may see, on the verge of the
grave.
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