Old Oliver would stand for a few minutes leaning
heavily on Tony's shoulder, and trembling from head to foot, as his eyes
wandered over all the front of the building; and then a low, wailing cry
would break from his lips, "Dear Lord! there was no room for my little
love, but thou hast found room for her!"
It was a reopening of Tony's sorrow when Aunt Charlotte came up from the
country to find that the little child had gone away altogether, leaving
only her tiny frocks and clothes, which were neatly folded up in a
drawer, where old Oliver treasured up a keepsake or two of his wife's.
She discovered, too, that old Oliver had forgotten to write to
Susan,--indeed, his hand had become too trembling to hold a pen,--and she
wrote herself; but her letter did not reach Calcutta before Susan and her
husband had left it, being homeward bound.
It was as nearly two years as it could well be since the summer evening
when Susan Raleigh had sent her little girl into old Oliver's shop,
bidding her be a good girl till she came home, and thinking it would be
only three days before she saw her again. It was nearly two years, and an
evening something like it, when the door was darkened by the entrance of
a tall, fine-looking man, dressed as a soldier, but with one empty sleeve
looped up across his chest.
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