Here, with her head on her grandfather’s grave, and the faithful dog crouched at her feet, lay the orphan, wrestling with grief and loneliness, striving to face a future that loomed before her spectre-thronged; and here Mr. Wood found her when anxiety at her long absence induced his wife to search for the missing invalid.  The storm of sobs and tears had spent itself, fortitude took the measure of the burden imposed, shouldered the galling weight, and henceforth, with undimmed vision, walked steadily to the appointed goal.  The miller was surprised to find her so calm, and as they went homeward she asked the particulars of all that had occurred, and thanked him gravely but cordially for the kind care bestowed upon her, and for the last friendly offices performed for her grandfather.

Conscious of her complete helplessness and physical prostration, she ventured no allusion to the future, but waited patiently until renewed strength permitted the execution of designs now fully mapped out.  Notwithstanding her feebleness, she rendered herself invaluable to Mrs. Wood, who praised her dexterity and neatness as a seamstress, and predicted that she would make a model housekeeper.

Late one Sunday evening in May, as the miller and his wife sat upon the steps of their humble and comfortless looking home, they saw Edna slowly approaching, and surmised where she had spent the afternoon.  Instead of going into the house she seated herself beside them, and, removing her bonnet, traces of tears were visible on her sad but patient face.

“You ought not to go over yonder so often, child.  It is not good for you,” said the miller, knocking the ashes from his pipe.

She shaded her countenance with her hand, and after a moment said, in a low but steady tone: 

“I shall never go there again.  I have said good-bye to everything, and have nothing now to keep me here.  You and Mrs. Wood have been very kind to me, and I thank you heartily; but you have a family of children, and have your hands full to support them without taking care of me.  I know that our house must go to you to pay that old debt, and even the horse and cow; and there will be nothing left when you are paid.  You are very good, indeed, to offer me a home here, and I never can forget your kindness; but I should not be willing to live on anybody’s charity; and besides, all the world is alike to me now, and I want to get out of sight of—­of—­what shows my sorrow to me every day.  I don’t love this place now; it won’t let me forget, even for a minute, and—­and—­”

Here the voice faltered and she paused.

“But where could you go, and how could you make your bread, you poor little ailing thing?”

“I hear that in the town of Columbus, Georgia, even little children get wages to work in the factory, and I know I can earn enough to pay my board among the factory people.”

“But you are too young to be straying about in a strange place.  If you will stay here, and help my wife about the house and the weaving, I will take good care of you, and clothe you till you are grown and married.”