IT became necessary for me to think how soon I could be ready, and arrange to get my leave-takings over by a certain time. Dr. Sandford could not wait for me. He was an army surgeon now, I found, and stationed at Washington. He had to return to his post and leave Miss Pinshon to bring me up to Washington. I fancy matters were easily arranged with Miss Pinshon. She was as meek as a lamb. But it never was her way to fight against circumstances. The doctor ordered that I should come up to Washington in a week or two.

I did not know till he was gone what a hard week it was going to be.

As soon as he had turned his back upon Magnolia, my leave-takings began. I may say they began sooner; for in the morning after his arrival, when Margaret was in my room, she fell to questioning me about the truth of the rumour that had reached the kitchen. Jem said I was going away, not to come back. I do not know how he had got hold of the notion. And when I told her it was true, she dropped the pine splinters out of her hands, and rising to her feet, besought me that I would take her with me. So eagerly she besought me, that I had much difficulty to answer.

"I shall be in a school, Margaret," I said. "I could not have anybody there to wait on me."

"Miss Daisy won't never do everything for herself?"

"Yes, I must," I said. "All the girls do."

"I'd hire out then, Miss Daisy, while you don't want me—I'd be right smart—and I'd bring all my earnin's to you regular. 'Deed I will! Till Miss Daisy want me herself."

I felt my cheeks flush. She would bring her earnings to me. Yes, that was what we were doing.

"'Clar, Miss Daisy, do don't leave me behind! I could take washin' and do all Miss Daisy's things up right smart—don't believe they knows how to do things up there!—I'll come to no good if I don't go with Miss Daisy, sure."

"You can be good here as well as anywhere, Margaret," I said.

"Miss Daisy don' know. Miss Daisy, s'pose the devil walkin' round about a place; think it a nice place fur to be good in?"

"The devil is not in Magnolia more than anywhere else," I said.

"Dere Mass' Edwards—" Margaret said half under her breath. Even in my room she would not speak the name out loud.

The end of it was, that I wrote up to Washington to Dr. Sandford to ask if I might take the girl with me; and his answer came back, that if it were any pleasure to me I certainly might. So that matter was settled. But the parting with the rest was hard. I do not know whether it was hardest for them or for me. Darry blessed me and prayed for me. Maria wept over me. Theresa mourned and lamented. Tears and wailings came from all the poor women who knew me best and used to come to the Sunday readings: and Pete took occasion to make private request, that when I was grown, or when at any time I should want a manservant, I would remember and send for him. He could do anything, he said; he could drive horses or milk cows or take care of a garden, or cook. It was said in a subdued voice, and though with a gleam of his white circle of teeth at the last-mentioned accomplishment, it was said with a depth of grave earnestness which troubled me. I promised as well as I could; but my heart was very sore for my poor people, left now without anybody, even so much as a child, to look after their comfort and give them any hopes for one world or the other.

Those heavy days were done at last. Margaret was speedy with my packing; a week from the time of Dr. Sandford's coming, I had said my last lesson to Miss Pinshon, read my last reading to my poor people, shaken the last hand-shakings; and we were on the little steamer plying down the Sands river.

I think I was wearied out, for I remember no excitement or interest about the journey, which ought to have had so much for me. In a passive state of mind I followed Miss Pinshon from steamer to station; from one train of cars to another; and saw the familiar landscape flit before me as the cars whirled us on. At Baytown we had been joined by a gentleman who went with us all the rest of the way; and I began by degrees to comprehend that my governess had changed her vocation, and instead of taking care, as heretofore, was going to be taken care of. It did not interest me. I saw it, that was all. I saw Margaret's delight, too, shown by every quick and thoughtful movement that could be of any service to me, and by a certain inexpressible air of deliverance which sat on her, I cannot tell how, from her bonnet down to her shoes. But her delight reminded me of those that were not delivered.

I think of all the crushing griefs that a young person can be called to bear, one of the sorest is the feeling of wrongdoing on the part of a beloved father or mother. I was sure that my father, blinded by old habit and bound by the laws of the country, did not in the least degree realise the true state of the matter. I knew that the real colour of his gold had never been seen by him. Not the less, I knew now that it was bloody; and what was worse, though I do not know why it should be worse, I knew that it was soiled. I knew that greed and dishonour were the two collectors of our revenue, and wrong our agent. Do I use strong words? They are not too strong for the feelings which constantly bore upon my heart, nor too bitter; though my childish heart never put them into such words at the time. That my father did not know, saved my love and reverence for him; but it did not change anything else.

In the last stage of our journey, as we left a station where the train had stopped, I noticed a little book left on one of the empty seats of the car. It lay there and nobody touched it: till we were leaving the car at Alexandria and almost everybody had gone out, and I saw that it lay there still and nobody would claim it. In passing I took it up. It was a neat little book, with gilt edges, no name in it, and having its pages numbered for the days of the year. And each page was full of Bible words. It looked nice. I put the book in my pocket; and on board the ferry-boat opened it again, and looked for the date of the day in March where we were. I found the words—"He preserveth the way of his saints." They were the words heading the page. I had not time for another bit; but as I left the boat this went into my heart like a cordial.

It was a damp, dark morning. The air was chill as we left the little boat cabin; the streets were dirty; there was a confusion of people seeking carriages or porters or baggage or custom; then suddenly I felt as if I had lighted on a tower of strength, for Dr. Sandford stood at my side. A good-humoured sort of a tower he looked to me, in his steady, upright bearing; and his military coat helped the impression of that. I can see now his touch of his cap to Miss Pinshon, and then the quick glance which took in Margaret and me. In another minute I had shaken hands with my governess, and was in a carriage with Margaret opposite me; and Dr. Sandford was giving my baggage in charge to somebody. And then he took his place beside me and we drove off. And I drew a long breath.

"Punctual to your time, Daisy," said the doctor. "But what made you choose such a time? How much of yourself have you left by the way?"

"Miss Pinshon liked better to travel all night," I said, "because there was no place where she liked to stop to spend the night."

"What was your opinion on that subject?"

"I was more tired than she was, I suppose."

"Has she managed things on the same system for the four years past?"

The doctor put the question with such a cool gravity, that I could not help laughing. Yet I believe my laughing was very near crying. At first he did so put me in mind of all that was about me when I used to see him in that time long before. And an inexpressible feeling of comfort was in his presence now; a feeling of being taken care of. I had been looked after, undoubtedly, all these years—sharply looked after; there was never a night that I could go to sleep without my governess coming in to see that I was in my room, or in bed, and my clothes in order, and my light where it ought to be. And my aunt had not forgotten me, nor her perplexities about me. And Preston had petted me when he was near. But even Preston sometimes lost sight of me in the urgency of his own pleasure or business. There was a great difference in the strong hand of Dr. Sandford's care; and if you had ever looked into his blue eyes, you would know that they forgot nothing. They had always fascinated me; they did now.

Mrs. Sandford was not up when we got to the house where she was staying. It was no matter, for a room was ready for me; and Dr. Sandford had a nice little breakfast brought, and saw me eat it, just as if I were a patient. Then he ordered me to bed, and charged Margaret to watch over me, and he went away, as he said, till luncheon time.

I drew two or three long breaths as Margaret was undressing me; I felt so comfortable.

"Are Miss Pinshon done gone away, Miss Daisy?" my handmaid asked.

"From Magnolia? yes."

"Where she gwine to?"

"I don't know."

"Then she don't go furder along the way we're goin'?"

"No. I wonder, Margaret, if they will have any prayer-meetings in Magnolia now?" For with the mention of Magnolia my thoughts swept back.

"'Spect the overseer have his ugly old way!" Margaret uttered with great disgust. "Miss Daisy done promise me, I go 'long with Miss Daisy?" she added.

"Yes. But what makes you want to get away from home more than all the rest of them?"

"Reckon I'd done gone kill myself, s'pose Miss Daisy leave me there," the girl said gloomily. "If dey send me down South, I would."

"Send you South!" I said; "they would not do that, Margaret."

"Dere was man wantin' to buy me—give mighty high price, de overseer said." In excitement Margaret's tongue sometimes grew thick, like those of her neighbours.

"Mr. Edwards has no right to sell anybody away from the place," I insisted, in mixed unbelief and horror.

"Dunno," said Margaret. "Don't make no difference, Miss Daisy. Who care what he do? Dere's Pete's wife—"

"Pete's wife?" said I. "I didn't know Pete was married! What of Pete's wife?"

"Dat doctor will kill me, for sure!" said Margaret, looking at me. "Do, don't, Miss Daisy! The doctor say you must go right to bed, now. See! you ain't got your clothes off."

"Stop," said I. "What about Pete's wife?"

"I done forget. I thought Miss Daisy knowed. Mebbe it's before Miss Daisy come home."

"What?" said I. "What?"

"It's nothin', Miss Daisy. The overseer he done got mad with Pete's wife and he sold her down South, he did."

"Away from Pete?" said I.

"Pete, he's to de old place," said Margaret, laconically. "'Spect he forgot all about it by dis time. Miss Daisy please have her clothes off and go to bed?"

There was nothing more to wait for. I submitted, was undressed; but the rest and sleep which had been desired were far out of reach now. Pete's wife?—my good, strong, gentle, and I remembered always grave, Pete! My heart was on fire with indignation and torn to pieces with sorrow, both at once. Torn with the helpless feeling too that I could not mend the wrong. I do not mean this individual wrong, but the whole state of things under which such wrong was possible. I was restless on my bed, though very weary. I would rather have been up and doing something, than to lie and look at my trouble; only that being there kept me out of the way of seeing people and of talking. Such things done under my father and mother's own authority,—on their own land—to their own helpless dependants; whom yet it was they made helpless and kept subject to such possibilities. I turned and tossed, feeling that I must do something, while yet I knew I could do nothing. Pete's wife! And where was she now? And that was the secret of the unvarying grave shadow that Pete's brow always wore. And now that I had quitted Magnolia, no human friend for the present remained to all that crowd of poor and ignorant and needy humanity. Even their comfort of prayer forbidden; except such comfort as each believer might take by himself alone.

I did not know, I never did know till long after, how to many at Magnolia that prohibition wrought no harm. I think Margaret knew, and even then did not dare tell me. How the meetings for prayer were not stopped. How watch was kept on certain nights, till all stir had ceased in the little community; till lights were out in the overseer's house (and at the great house, while we were there); and how then, silently and softly from their several cabins, the people stole away through the woods to a little hill beyond the cemetery, quite far out of hearing or ken of anybody; and there prayed, and sang too, and "praised God and shouted," as my informant told me; not neglecting all the while to keep a picket watch about their meeting-place, to give the alarm in case anybody should come. So under the soft moonlight skies and at depth of night, the meetings which I had supposed broken up, took new life, and grew, and lived; and prayers did not fail; and the Lord hearkened and heard.

It would have comforted me greatly if I could have known this at the time. But, as I said, I supposed Margaret dared not tell me. After a long time of weary tossing and heartache, sleep came at last to me; but it brought Pete and his wife and the overseer and Margaret in new combinations of trouble; and I got little refreshment.

"Now you have waked up, Miss Daisy?" said Margaret when I opened my eyes. "That poundin' noise has done waked you!"

"What noise?"

"It's no Christian noise," said Margaret. "What's the use of turnin' the house into a clap of thunder like that? But a man was makin' it o' purpose, for I went out to see; and he telled me it was to call folks to luncheon. Will you get up, Miss Daisy?"

Margaret spoke as if she thought I had much better lie still; but I was weary of the comfort I had found there and disposed to try something else. I had just time to be ready before Dr. Sandford came for me and took me to his sister-in-law. Mrs. Sandford welcomed me with great kindness, even tenderness; exclaimed at my growth; but I saw by her glance at the doctor that my appearance in other respects struck her unfavourably. He made no answer to that, but carried us off to the luncheon-room.

There were other people lodging in the house besides my friends; a long table was spread. Dr. Sandford, I saw, was an immense favourite. Questions and demands upon his attention came thick and fast from both ends and all sides of the table; about all sorts of subjects and in all manner of tones, grave and gay. And he was at home to them all, but in the midst of it never forgot me. He took careful heed to my luncheon; prepared one thing, and called for another; it reminded me of a time long gone by; but it did not help me to eat. I could not eat. The last thing he did was to call for a fresh raw egg, and break it into a half glass of milk. With this in his hand we left the dining-room. As soon as we got to Mrs. Sandford's parlour he gave it to me and ordered me to swallow it. I suppose I looked dismayed.

"Poor child!" said Mrs. Sandford. "Let me have it beaten up for her, Grant, with some sugar; she can't take it so."

"Daisy has done harder things," he said.

I saw he expected me to drink it, and so I did, I do not know how.

"Thank you," he said smiling, as he took the glass. "Now sit down and I will talk to you."

"How she is growing tall, Grant!" said Mrs. Sandford.

"Yes," said he. "Did you sleep well, Daisy?"

"No, sir; I couldn't sleep. And then I dreamed."

"Dreaming is not a proper way of resting. So tired you could not sleep?"

"I do not think it was that, Dr. Sandford."

"Do you know what it was?"

"I think I do," I said, a little unwillingly.

"She is getting very much the look of her mother," Mrs. Sandford remarked again. "Don't you see it, Grant?"

"I see more than that," he answered. "Daisy, do you think this governess of yours has been a good governess?"

I looked wearily out of the window, and cast a weary mental look over the four years of algebraics and philosophy at the bright little child I saw at the further end of them.

"I think I have grown dull, Dr. Sandford," I said.

He came up behind me, and put his arms round me, taking my hand in his, and spoke in quite a different tone.

"Daisy, have you found many 'wonderful things' at Magnolia?"

I looked up, I remember, with the eagerness of a heart full of thoughts, in his face; but I could not speak then.

"Have you looked through a microscope since you have been there, and made discoveries?"

"Not in natural things, Dr. Sandford."

"Ha!" said the doctor. "Do you want to go and take a drive with me?"

"Oh yes!"

"Go and get ready then, please."

I had a very pleasant, quiet drive; the doctor showing me, as he said, not wonderful things but new things, and taking means to amuse me. And every day for several days I had a drive. Sometimes we went to the country, sometimes got out and examined something in the city. There was a soothing relief in it all, and in the watchful care taken of me at home, and the absence of mathematics and philosophy. All day when not driving or at meals, I lay on Mrs. Sandford's sofa or curled myself up in the depth of a great easy-chair, and turned over her books; or studied my own blue book which I had picked up in the car, and which was so little I had Margaret to make a big pocket in my frock to hold it. But this life was not to last. A few days was all Mrs. Sandford had to spend in Washington.

The place I liked best to go to was the Capitol. Several times Dr. Sandford took me there, and showed me the various great rooms, and paintings, and smaller rooms with their beautiful adornments; and I watched the workmen at work; for the renewing of the building was not yet finished. As long as he had time to spare, Dr. Sandford let me amuse myself as I would; and often got me into talks which refreshed me more than anything. Still, though I was soothed, my trouble at heart was not gone. One day we were sitting looking at the pictures in the great vestibule, when Dr. Sandford suddenly started a subject which put the Capitol out of my head.

"Daisy," said he, "was it your wish or Margaret's, that she should go North with you?"

"Hers," I said, startled.

"Then it is not yours particularly."

"Yes, it is, Dr. Sandford, very particularly."

"How is that?" said he.

I hesitated. I shrank from the whole subject; it was so extremely sore to me.

"I ought to warn you," he went on, "that if you take her further, she may, if she likes, leave you, and claim her freedom. That is the law. If her owner takes her into the free States, she may remain in them if she will, whether he does or not."

I was silent still, for the whole thing choked me. I was quite willing she should have her freedom, get it any way she could; but there was my father, and his pleasure and interest, which might not choose to lose a piece of his property; and my mother and her interest and pleasure; I knew what both would be. I was dumb.

"You had not thought of this before?" the doctor went on.

"No, sir."

"Does it not change your mind about taking her on?"

"No, sir."

"Did it ever occur to you, or rather, does it not occur to you now, that the girl's design in coming may have been this very purpose of her freedom?"

"I do not think it was," I said.

"Even if not, it will be surely put in her head by other people before she has been at the North long; and she will know that she is her own mistress."

I was silent still. I knew that I wished she might.

"Do you think," Dr. Sandford went on, "that in this view of the case we had better send her back to Magnolia when you leave Washington?"

"No," I said.

"I think it would be better," he repeated.

"Oh, no!" I said. "Oh, no, Dr. Sandford. I can't send her back. You will not send her back, will you?"

"Be quiet," he said, holding fast the hand which in my earnestness I had put in his; "she is not my servant; she is yours; it is for you to say what you will do."

"I will not send her back," I said.

"But it may be right to consider what would be Mr. Randolph's wish on the subject. If you take her, he may lose several hundred dollars' worth of property: it is right for me to warn you. Would he choose to run the risk?"

I remember now what a fire at my heart sent the blood to my face. But with my hand in Dr. Sandford's, and those blue eyes of his reading me, I could not keep back my thought.

"She ought to be her own mistress," I said.

A brilliant flash of expression filled the blue eyes and crossed his face—I could hardly tell what, before it was gone. Quick surprise—pleasure—amusement—agreement; the first and the two last certainly; and the pleasure I could not help fancying had lent its colour to that ray of light which had shot for one instant from those impenetrable eyes. He spoke just as usual.

"But, Daisy, have you studied this question?"

"I think I have studied nothing else, Dr. Sandford."

"You know the girl is not yours, but your father's."

"She isn't anybody's," I said slowly, and with slow tears gathering in my heart.

"How do you mean?" said he, with again the quiver of a smile upon his lips.

"I mean," I said, struggling with my thoughts and myself, "I mean that nobody could have a right to her."

"Did not her parents belong to your father?"

"To my mother."

"Then she does."

"But, Dr. Sandford," I said, "nobody can belong to anybody—in that way."

"How do you make it out, Daisy?"

"Because nobody can give anybody a right to anybody else in that way."

"Does it not give your mother a right, that the mother of this girl and her grandmother were the property of your ancestors?"

"They could not be their property justly," I said, glad to get back to my ancestors.

"The law made it so."

"Not God's law, Dr. Sandford," I said, looking up at him.

"No? Does not that law give a man a right to what he has honestly bought?"

"No," I said, "it can't—not if it has been dishonestly sold."

"Explain, Daisy," said Dr. Sandford, very quietly; but I saw the gleam of that light in his eye again. I had gone too far to stop. I went on, ready to break my heart over the right and wrong I was separating.

"I mean, the first people that sold the first of these coloured people," I said.

"Well?" said the doctor.

"They could not have a right to sell them."

"Yes. Well?"

"Then the people that bought them could not have a right, any more," I said.

"But, Daisy," said Dr. Sandford, "do you know that there are different opinions on this very point?"

I was silent. It made no difference to me.

"Suppose for the moment that the first people, as you say, had no precise right to sell the men and women they brought to this country; yet those who bought them and paid honest money for them, and possessed them from generation to generation—had not they a right to pass them off upon other hands, receiving their money back again?"

"I don't know how to explain it," I said. "I mean—if at first—Dr. Sandford, hadn't the people that were sold, hadn't they rights too?"

"Rights of what sort?"

"A right to do what they liked with themselves, and to earn money, and to keep their wives?"

"But those rights were lost, you know, Daisy."

"But could they be?" I said. "I mean—Dr. Sandford, for instance, suppose somebody stole your watch from you; would you lose the right to it?"

"It seems to me that I should not, Daisy."

"That is what I mean," I said.

"But there is another view of the case, Daisy. Take Margaret, for instance. From the time she was a child, your father's, or your mother's money has gone to support her; her food and clothing and living have been wholly at their expense. Does not that give them a right to her services? ought they not to be repaid?"

I did not want to speak of my father and mother and Margaret. It was coming too near home. I knew the food and clothing Dr. Sandford spoke of; I knew a very few months of a Northern servant's wages would have paid for it all; was this girl's whole life to be taken from her, and by my father and mother, and for such a cause? The feeling of grief and wrong and shame got possession of me. I was ready to break my heart in tears; but I could not show Dr. Sandford what I felt, nor confess to what I thought of my father's action. I had the greatest struggle with myself not to give way and cry. I was very weak bodily, but I know I stood still and did not shed a tear; till I felt Dr. Sandford's hands take hold of me. They put me gently back in the chair from which I had risen.

"What is the matter, Daisy?" he said.

I would not speak, and he did not urge it; but I saw that he watched me till I gained command of myself again.

"Shall we go home now?" he asked.

"In a minute. Dr. Sandford, I do not think papa knows about all this—I do not think he knows about it as I do. I am sure he does not; and when he knows he will think as I do."

"Or perhaps you will think as he does."

I was silent. I wondered if that could be possible—if I too could have my eyes blinded as I saw other people's were.

"Little Daisy," said my friend the doctor, "but you are getting to be not little Daisy. How old are you?"

"I shall be fourteen in June."

"Fourteen. Well, it is no wonder that my friend whom I left a philosopher at ten years old, I should find a woman at fourteen; but Daisy, you must not take it on your heart that you have to teach all the ignorant and help all the distressed that come in your way; because simply you cannot do it."

I looked up at him. I could not tell him what I thought, because he would not, I feared, understand it. Christ came to do just such work, and His servants must have it on their hearts to do the same. I cannot tell what was in my look, but I thought the doctor's face changed.

"One Molly Skelton will do for one four years," he said as he rose up. "Come, Daisy."

"But, Dr. Sandford," I said, as I followed him, "you will not do anything about sending Margaret back?"

"Nothing, till you do, Daisy."

Arrived at home, the doctor made me drink a raw egg, and lie down on Mrs. Sandford's sofa; and he sat down and looked at me.

"You are the most troublesome patient that ever I had," said he.

"I am?" I exclaimed.

"Yes. Quite innocently. You cannot help it, Daisy; and you need not be troubled about it. It is all in the way of my profession. It is as if a delicate vessel of Egyptian glass were put to do the work of an iron smelting furnace; and I have to think of all the possible bands and hardening appliances that can be brought into use for the occasion."

"I do not understand," I said.

"No; I suppose not. That is the worst of it."

"But why am I an Egyptian glass?" I asked. "I am not very old."

The doctor gave me one of those quick, bright glances and smiles that were very pleasant to get from him and not very common. There came a sort of glow and sparkle in his blue eye then, and a wonderful winsome and gracious trick of the lips.

"It is a very doubtful sort of a compliment," said Mrs. Sandford.

"I did not mean it for a compliment at all," said the doctor.

"I don't believe you did," said his sister; "but what did you mean? Grant, I should like to hear you pay a compliment for once."

"You do not know Egyptian glass," said the doctor.

"No. What was it?"

"Very curious."

"Didn't I say that you couldn't pay compliments?" said Mrs. Sandford.

"And unlike any that is made nowadays. There were curious patterns wrought in the glass, made, it is supposed, by the fusing together of rods of glass, extremely minute, of different colours; so that the pattern once formed was ineffaceable and indestructible, unless by the destruction of the vessel which contained it. Sometimes a layer of gold was introduced between the layers of glass."

"How very curious!" said Mrs. Sandford.

"I think I must take you into consultation, Daisy," the doctor went on, turning to me. "It is found that there must be a little delay before you can go up to take a look at Melbourne. Mrs. Sandford is obliged to stop in New York with a sick sister; how long she may be kept there it is impossible to say. Now you would have a dull time, I am afraid; and I am in doubt whether it would not be pleasanter for you to enter school at once. In about three months the school term will end and the summer vacation begin; by that time Mrs. Sandford will be at home and the country ready to receive you. But you shall do whichever you like best."

"Mrs. Sandford will be in New York," I said.

"Yes."

"And I would see you constantly, dear, and have you with me all the Saturdays and Sundays and holidays. And if you like it better, you shall be with me all the time; only I should be obliged to leave you alone too much."

"How long does the summer vacation last?" I inquired.

"Till some time in September. You can enter school now or then, as you choose."

I thought and hesitated, and said I would enter at once. Dr. Sandford said I was not fit for it, but it was on the whole the best plan. So it was arranged, that I should just wait a day or two in New York to get my wardrobe in order and then begin my school experience.

But my thoughts went back afterwards, more than once, to the former conversation; and I wondered what it was about me that made Dr. Sandford liken me to Egyptian glass.