Alas! I little knew that my own lack of will-power, my delicate
health, and the consequent uncertainty as to my future weighed far more
heavily on my grandmother's mind than any little breach of the rules by
her husband, during those endless perambulations, afternoon and evening,
in which we used to see passing up and down, obliquely raised towards the
heavens, her handsome face with its brown and wrinkled cheeks, which with
age had acquired almost the purple hue of tilled fields in autumn,
covered, if she were walking abroad, by a half-lifted veil, while upon
them either the cold or some sad reflection invariably left the drying
traces of an involuntary tear.
My sole consolation when I went upstairs for the night was that Mamma
would come in and kiss me after I was in bed. But this good night lasted
for so short a time: she went down again so soon that the moment in which
I heard her climb the stairs, and then caught the sound of her garden
dress of blue muslin, from which hung little tassels of plaited straw,
rustling along the double-doored corridor, was for me a moment of the
keenest sorrow. So much did I love that good night that I reached the
stage of hoping that it would come as late as possible, so as to prolong
the time of respite during which Mamma would not yet have appeared.
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