For I saw very well that I could not have been intended to die, or I should never have lived; not to say should never have been reserved for such a happy life.  I saw very well how many things had worked together for my welfare, and that if the sins of the fathers were sometimes visited upon the children, the phrase did not mean what I had in the morning feared it meant.  I knew I was as innocent of my birth as a queen of hers and that before my Heavenly Father I should not be punished for birth nor a queen rewarded for it.  I had had experience, in the shock of that very day, that I could, even thus soon, find comforting reconcilements to the change that had fallen on me.  I renewed my resolutions and prayed to be strengthened in them, pouring out my heart for myself and for my unhappy mother and feeling that the darkness of the morning was passing away.  It was not upon my sleep; and when the next day’s light awoke me, it was gone.

My dear girl was to arrive at five o’clock in the afternoon.  How to help myself through the intermediate time better than by taking a long walk along the road by which she was to come, I did not know; so Charley and I and Stubbs—­Stubbs saddled, for we never drove him after the one great occasion—­made a long expedition along that road and back.  On our return, we held a great review of the house and garden and saw that everything was in its prettiest condition, and had the bird out ready as an important part of the establishment.

There were more than two full hours yet to elapse before she could come, and in that interval, which seemed a long one, I must confess I was nervously anxious about my altered looks.  I loved my darling so well that I was more concerned for their effect on her than on any one.  I was not in this slight distress because I at all repined—­I am quite certain I did not, that day—­but, I thought, would she be wholly prepared?  When she first saw me, might she not be a little shocked and disappointed?  Might it not prove a little worse than she expected?  Might she not look for her old Esther and not find her?  Might she not have to grow used to me and to begin all over again?

I knew the various expressions of my sweet girl’s face so well, and it was such an honest face in its loveliness, that I was sure beforehand she could not hide that first look from me.  And I considered whether, if it should signify any one of these meanings, which was so very likely, could I quite answer for myself?

Well, I thought I could.  After last night, I thought I could.  But to wait and wait, and expect and expect, and think and think, was such bad preparation that I resolved to go along the road again and meet her.

So I said to Charley, “Charley, I will go by myself and walk along the road until she comes.”  Charley highly approving of anything that pleased me, I went and left her at home.

But before I got to the second milestone, I had been in so many palpitations from seeing dust in the distance (though I knew it was not, and could not, be the coach yet) that I resolved to turn back and go home again.  And when I had turned, I was in such fear of the coach coming up behind me (though I still knew that it neither would, nor could, do any such thing) that I ran the greater part of the way to avoid being overtaken.