Linders
dictated these last words, "but you are about to recommend
your child to your sister's care; of what use can it be to
begin with words that can only embitter any ill-feeling there
may have been between you?"
"But it is a great consolation I am offering her there," says
M. Linders, in his feeble voice. "However, as you will--
_recommencons;_ but no more interruptions, Monsieur, for my
strength is not inexhaustible."
"Ma soeur,--It is now five and twenty years since we parted,
with the determination never to see each other again. Whether
we have done well to keep this resolution or not, matters
little now; we shall, at any rate, have no temptation in the
future to break it, for I shall be in my grave before your
receive this letter. I am dying, a fact which may possess some
faint interest for you even now--or may not--that is not to the
purpose either. It is not of myself that I would speak, but of
my child. I am sending her to you, Therese, as to the only
relative she has in the world; look on her, if you prefer it,
as your mother's only grandchild; we had a mother once who
loved me, and whom you professed to love--for her sake be kind
to Madelon.
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