"A little. It seems I made a great mistake in not going to Boston. Is it too late now?"
"Yes, dear. Fortune does not stand twice on a man's threshold. New York was our point of turning, and we turned to the West, instead of the North."
"Mr. Curtis would not renew his offer, I suppose?"
"If he did, you would have to tell him all that has taken place."
"Milly, I have seen all my life, that it is very near as bad to be accused as it is to be guilty. In a few words, a man is accused of some cruel or dishonorable deed--four or five words will do that wrong--but the accused, however innocent, cannot go about with the proofs of his innocence in his pocket, and expect people to take an interest in them. That unspeakable man knew this; he calculated on its influence, even if his plot failed."
"Do not let us speak of him. His very name is malign on our lips. Robert, we have been traveling thousands of miles towards Texas. Shall we turn back now? Or shall we go on?"
"Then we had better go forward to Texas."
So Robert took passage for us on _The Lone Star_, bound for Galveston, and I had a singular failure of heart and hope. I had longed so to go to Boston, but that prayer had fallen from out my prayers and had come to nothing. Chicago had been our first station on a wrong road; all it promised had turned to failure, and it had taken the hand of God to lift us out of the ruth and ruin we met in places to which we were not sent. Yellow fever and cholera had driven us down that dreary, steaming, terrible river. Would Texas indeed give a future to our mistaken past? Then my eyes fell upon my children playing with such careless sweet content in the cool, dusky room. They had no fear as to where their father and I were going to take them. They believed in our love and wisdom. Would God be less kind to us than we were to them? Impossible! Then why not give Him the same child-like confidence and affection? For, if I did not know where we were going, I did know
"We could not drift, Beyond God's love and care."
"... all that is most beauteous imaged there In happier beauty; more pellucid streams In ampler ether, a diviner air, And fields invested with purpureal gleams."
We left New Orleans that evening, and, on the second morning thereafter, we were far out on the Gulf of Mexico. The blessed north wind was gently rocking _The Lone Star_. I could smell the sea, and hear the beating of its great heart, as deep called unto deep. Then, raising myself in my berth, I could see the white horses chasing each other over the blue waters. The port hole being open, I had been drinking oxygen all night, and I was a new woman, fit for anything, and afraid of nothing that could come to me.