"ElizabethGaskell-LizzieLeigh" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gaskell Elizabeth C)

die till I've seen her once again. Thou dost not know how I've
prayed and prayed just once again to see her sweet face, and tell her
I've forgiven her, though she's broken my heart--she has, Will." She
could not go on for a minute or two for the choking sobs. "Thou dost
not know that, or thou wouldst not say she could be dead--for God is
very merciful, Will; He is: He is much more pitiful than man. I
could never ha' spoken to thy father as I did to Him--and yet thy
father forgave her at last. The last words he said were that he
forgave her. Thou'lt not be harder than thy father, Will? Do not
try and hinder me going to seek her, for it's no use."

Will sat very still for a long time before he spoke. At last he
said, "I'll not hinder you. I think she's dead, but that's no
matter."

"She's not dead," said her mother, with low earnestness. Will took
no notice of the interruption.

"We will all go to Manchester for a twelvemonth, and let the farm to
Tom Higginbotham. I'll get blacksmith's work; and Tom can have good
schooling for awhile, which he's always craving for. At the end of
the year you'll come back, mother, and give over fretting for Lizzie,
and think with me that she is dead--and, to my mind, that would be
more comfort than to think of her living;" he dropped his voice as he
spoke these last words. She shook her head but made no answer. He
asked again--"Will you, mother, agree to this?"

"I'll agree to it a-this-ns," said she. "If I hear and see nought of
her for a twelvemonth, me being in Manchester looking out, I'll just
ha' broken my heart fairly before the year's ended, and then I shall
know neither love nor sorrow for her any more, when I'm at rest in my
grave. I'll agree to that, Will."

"Well, I suppose it must be so. I shall not tell Tom, mother, why
we're flitting to Manchester. Best spare him."

"As thou wilt," said she, sadly, "so that we go, that's all."

Before the wild daffodils were in flower in the sheltered copses
round Upclose Farm, the Leighs were settled in their Manchester home;
if they could ever grow to consider that place as a home, where there
was no garden or outbuilding, no fresh breezy outlet, no far-
stretching view, over moor and hollow; no dumb animals to be tended,
and, what more than all they missed, no old haunting memories, even
though those remembrances told of sorrow, and the dead and gone.

Mrs. Leigh heeded the loss of all these things less than her sons.
She had more spirit in her countenance than she had had for months,
because now she had hope; of a sad enough kind, to be sure, but still
it was hope. She performed all her household duties, strange and