Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics

Chapter XXIII

ONE NIGHT

N

ever did the sun go down with a brighter glory on the

quiet corner in Soho, than one memorable evening when

the Doctor and his daughter sat under the plane-tree

together. Never did the moon rise with a milder radiance over

great London, than on that night when it found them still seated

under the tree, and shone upon their faces through its leaves.

Lucie was to be married tomorrow. She had reserved this last

evening for her father, and they sat alone under the plane-tree.

“You are happy, my dear father?”

“Quite, my child.”

They had said little, though they had been there a long time.

When it was yet light enough to work and read, she had neither

engaged herself in her usual work, nor had she read to him. She

had employed herself in both ways, at his side under the tree,

many and many a time; but, this time was not quite like any other,

and nothing could make it so.

“And I am very happy tonight, dear father. I am deeply happy

in the love that Heaven has so blessedmy love for Charles, and

Charles’s love for me. But, if my life were not to be still

consecrated to you, or if my marriage were so arranged as that it

would part us, even by the length of a few of these streets, I should

be more unhappy and self-reproachful now than I can tell you.

Even as it is” Even as it was, she could not command her voice.

In the sad moonlight, she clasped him by the neck, and laid her

Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics

face upon his breast. In the moonlight which is always sad, as the

light of the sun itself isas the light called human life isat its

coming and its going.

“Dearest dear! Can you tell me, this last time, that you feel

quite, quite sure, no new affections of mine, and no new duties of

mine, will ever interpose between us? I know it well, but do you

know it? In your own heart, do you feel quite certain?”

Her father answered, with a cheerful firmness of conviction he

could scarcely have assumed, “Quite sure, my darling! More than

that,” he added, as he tenderly kissed her: “my future is far

brighter, Lucie, seen through your marriage, than it could have

beennay, than it ever waswithout it.”

“If I could hope that, my father!”

“Believe it, love! Indeed it is so. Consider how natural and how

plain it is, my dear, that it should be so. You, devoted and young,

cannot fully appreciate the anxiety I have felt that your life should

not be wasted” She moved her hand towards his lips, but he

took it in his, and repeated the word.

“wasted, my childshould not be wasted, struck aside from

the natural order of thingsfor my sake. Your unselfishness

cannot entirely comprehend how much my mind has gone on this;