"Why, sure enough," said he, and then as the light from her lamp fell on
her features, he exclaimed, "why, how white you be! What's the matter?
Who's upstairs? Is George sick?"
"No, George is not sick," said Fanny, "but--," and then as well as she
could she told him all she knew.
Uncle Joshua's nervous system was unstrung, and his physical health
impaired by long nights of watching with his wife, and now when this fresh
shock came upon him, he fell back half-fainting upon his pillow. Then
rousing himself, he said, "Alive and come back! I don't desarve this. But
where is she? I will go to her."
Fanny directed him where to find her, and then returned to Julia, whither
her father soon followed. Uncle Joshua was not prepared for the change in
his daughter. He did not even think of her as he saw her last, wasted by
sickness, but in imagination he beheld her as she was in her days of
health and dazzling beauty, when with diabolical cunning she had brought
Dr. Lacey to her feet. Now, however, her face was thin, white and haggard,
for such a life as she had lived had never conduced to the beauty and
health of any one. Her eyes, sunken in their sockets, and swollen with
recent weeping, looked frightfully large and wild, and to complete the
metamorphosis, her beautiful, glossy hair was now cut short on her neck,
and pushed far back from a brow, across which lay more than one premature
wrinkle.
The sight of her for a time unsettled the old man's reason. Taking her in
his arms he alternately cried and laughed over her, saying, "I knew you'd
come. I expected it. I've waited for you."
Julia's altered appearance troubled him, and drawing her head down upon
his bosom, and laying his hand on her thin, white face, he said, "Poor
child, what has changed you so, and whar have you been; and who did I buy
that big stun for if 'twasn't for you?"
"Not tonight, dear father," answered Julia. "Let me rest tonight and
tomorrow I will tell you all."