er, but her child
was too young for such a journey, she concluded. Ben had sailed for
Switzerland. The summer, whose biography like an insignificant life
must be written in a few words, was a long one to live through. It
happened to be a dry season, which was unfrequent on our coast. Days
rolled by without the variation of wind, rain, or hazy weather. The
sky was an opaque blue till noon, when solid white clouds rose in the
north, and sailed seaward, or barred the sunset, which turned them
crimson and black. The mown fields grew yellow under the stare of
the brassy sun, and the leaves cracked and curled for the want of
moisture. It was dull in the village, no ships were building, none
sailed, none arrived. But father was more absorbed than ever, more
away from home. He wrote often in the evening, and pored over ledgers
with his bookkeeper. Late at night I found him sorting and reading
papers. He forgot us. But Fanny, as he grew forgetful, improved as
housekeeper. Her energy was untiring; she waited so much on him that
I grew forgetful of him. Veronica was the same as before; her room
was pleasant with color and perfume, the same delicate pains with her
dress each day was taken. She looked as fair as a lily, as serene as
the lake on which it floats, except when Fanny tried her. With me she
never lost temper. But I saw little of her; she was as fixed in her
individual pursuits as ever.

There were intervals now when all my grief for mother returned, and
I sat in my darkened chamber, recalling with a sad persistence her
gestures, her motions, the tones of her voice, through all the past
back to my first remembrance. The places she inhabited, her opinions
and her actions I commented on with a minuteness that allowed no
detail to escape. When my thoughts turned from her, it seemed as if
she were newly lost in the vast and wandering Universe of the Dead,
whence I had brought her.

In September a letter came from Ben, which promised a return by the
last of October. With the ruffling autumnal breezes my stagnation
vanished, and I began my shore life again in a mood which made memory
like hope; but staying out too late one evening, I came home in a
chill. From the chill I went to a fever, which lasted some days.
Veronica came every day to see me, and groaned over my hair, which
fell off, but she could not stay long, the smell of medicine made her
ill, the dark room gave her an uneasiness; besides, she did not know
what she sh