Witch Hazel; or, The Secret of the Locket — page 370: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The revelation, if it were indeed such, that she was the second daughter of Mrs. Stewart, did not appear to be a very coniforting or pleasing ane, for her fair face was clouded, an expression of pain contracted her sweet lips, her eyes were heavy with unshed tears, and her manner dejected. Why was this? All her life the mystery of her parentage had haunted her, and she had often longed to know just who she was, while at the same time she had instine- tively shrunk from the knowledge, fearing that it might prove painful, if not humiliating, to her. She idolized the woman. who, for 80 many years, had given her a mother’s tenderest love and care, and the thought that, if she should ever discover her own pavenies she might be obliged to leave, was torture to her. a Of late, however, the fear of this had grown leas and less, until, during this last year, she had come to believe that she should never learn the truth; that she would continue always to remain the loved and loving daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Earlescourt, and the fear of a separation had at last died entirely out. Now, like a thunderbolt had come this shock which some instinct, entirely beyond her power to compre- hend, made her feel sure that the mystery of her birth was about to be solved. Somehow she felt con- vineed that she was the little daurhter whom Mrs, Stewart had lost in Chicago at the time of the great fire of 1871, and that the young girl who at this mo- ment lay sobbing in her arms was her own sister. ‘Marie, if cannot he possible!” Belle said at last, sitting up and searching the troubled face before her for some further confirmation of the fact. ‘ “I feel very sure that it is true,” Marie yeniied ja alow, £vrave voice.