Forget all this miserable talk.
Say I am your mother!--I have loved you so long, and there is no other.
I am your mother, in the sight of God, and nothing shall ever take you from me!" All barriers fell, before this appeal.

Laura put her arms about her mother's neck and said: "You are my mother, and always shall be.

We will be as we have always been; and neither this foolish talk nor any other thing shall part us or make us less to each other than we are this hour." There was no longer any sense of separation or estrangement between them.
Indeed their love seemed more perfect now than it had ever been before.
By and by they went down stairs and sat by the fire and talked long and earnestly about Laura's history and the letters.

But it transpired that Mrs.Hawkins had never known of this correspondence between her husband and Major Lackland.

With his usual consideration for his wife, Mr.
Hawkins had shielded her from the worry the matter would have caused her.
Laura went to bed at last with a mind that had gained largely in tranquility and had lost correspondingly in morbid romantic exaltation.
She was pensive, the next day, and subdued; but that was not matter for remark, for she did not differ from the mournful friends about her in that respect.