What a night it
is; we sometimes get them in this part of England in October. It was
just such a night when my first wife died, and that is three years ago.
I remember how she sat up in her bed.
"Ah! those horrible elms," she said; "I wish you would have them cut
down, Frank; they cry like a woman," and I said I would, and just after
that she died, poor dear. And so the old elms stand, and I like their
music. It is a strange thing; I was half broken-hearted, for I loved her
dearly, and she loved me with all her life and strength, and now--I am
going to be married again.
"Frank, Frank, don't forget me!" Those were my wife's last words; and,
indeed, though I am going to be married again to-morrow, I have not
forgotten her. Nor shall I forget how Annie Guthrie (whom I am going to
marry now) came to see her the day before she died. I know that Annie
always liked me more or less, and I think that my dear wife guessed it.
After she had kissed Annie and bid her a last good-bye, and the door had
closed, she spoke quite suddenly: "There goes your future wife, Frank,"
she said; "you should have married her at first instead of me; she is
very handsome and very good, and she has two thousand a year; _she_
would never have died of a nervous illness.
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