She came
on the very last day you were here."
"Well, to be sure!" cried his sister, sinking down on a chair, but still
keeping the torn little frock in her hand.
"I've had two letters from poor Susan," he continued, in a tremulous
voice, "and I'll read them to you. The child's such a precious treasure
to me, Charlotte--such a little love, a hundred times better than any
gold; and now you're come to mend up her clothes a bit, and see what she
wants for me, there's nothing else that I desire. I was writing about her
to you when you came in."
"I thought you'd gone and picked up a lost child out of the streets,"
said Charlotte, with a sigh of relief.
"No, no; she's my own," he answered. "You hearken while I read poor
Susan's letters, and then you'll understand all about it. I couldn't give
her up for a hundred gold guineas--not for a deal more than that."
He knew Susan's letters off by heart, and did not need his spectacles,
nor a good light to read them by. Charlotte listened with emphatic nods,
and many exclamations of astonishment.
"That's very pretty of Susan," she remarked, "saying as Aunt Charlotte'll
do her sewing, and see to her manners.
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