Shirley
favour me thus far!" she cried. "God grant me a little comfort before I
die!" was her humble petition.
"But he will not know I am ill till I am gone, and he will come when
they have laid me out, and I am senseless, cold, and stiff.
"What can my departed soul feel then? Can it see or know what happens to
the clay? Can spirits, through any medium, communicate with living
flesh? Can the dead at all revisit those they leave? Can they come in
the elements? Will wind, water, fire, lend me a path to Moore?
"Is it for nothing the wind sounds almost articulately sometimes--sings
as I have lately heard it sing at night--or passes the casement sobbing,
as if for sorrow to come? Does nothing, then, haunt it, nothing inspire
it?
"Why, it suggested to me words one night; it poured a strain which I
could have written down, only I was appalled, and dared not rise to seek
pencil and paper by the dim watch-light.
"What is that electricity they speak of, whose changes make us well or
ill, whose lack or excess blasts, whose even balance revives? What are
all those influences that are about us in the atmosphere, that keep
playing over our nerves like fingers on stringed instruments, and call
forth now a sweet note, and now a wail--now an exultant swell, and anon
the saddest cadence?
"_Where is_ the other world? In _what_ will another life consist? Why do
I ask? Have I not cause to think that the hour is hasting but too fast
when the veil must be rent for me? Do I not know the Grand Mystery is
likely to burst prematurely on me? Great Spirit, in whose goodness I
confide, whom, as my Father, I have petitioned night and morning from
early infancy, help the weak creation of Thy hands! Sustain me through
the ordeal I dread and must undergo! Give me strength! Give me patience!
Give me--oh, _give me_ FAITH!"
She fell back on her pillow. Mrs. Pryor found means to steal quietly
from the room. She re-entered it soon after, apparently as composed as
if she had really not overheard this strange soliloquy.
The next day several callers came. It had become known that Miss
Helstone was worse. Mr. Hall and his sister Margaret arrived. Both,
after they had been in the sickroom, quitted it in tears; they had found
the patient more altered than they expected. Hortense Moore came.
Caroline seemed stimulated by her presence. She assured her, smiling,
she was not dangerously ill; she talked to her in a low voice, but
cheerfully. During her stay, excitement kept up the flush of her
complexion; she looked better.
"How is Mr. Robert?" asked Mrs. Pryor, as Hortense was preparing to take
leave.
"He was very well when he left."
"Left! Is he gone from home?"
It was then explained that some police intelligence about the rioters of
whom he was in pursuit had, that morning, called him away to Birmingham,
and probably a fortnight might elapse ere he returned.
"He is not aware that Miss Helstone is very ill?"
"Oh no! He thought, like me, that she had only a bad cold."
After this visit, Mrs. Pryor took care not to approach Caroline's couch
for above an hour. She heard her weep, and dared not look on her tears.
As evening closed in, she brought her some tea. Caroline, opening her
eyes from a moment's slumber, viewed her nurse with an unrecognizing
glance.
"I smelt the honeysuckles in the glen this summer morning," she said,
"as I stood at the counting-house window."
Strange words like these from pallid lips pierce a loving listener's
heart more poignantly than steel. They sound romantic, perhaps, in
books; in real life they are harrowing.
"My darling, do you know me?" said Mrs. Pryor.
"I went in to call Robert to breakfast. I have been with him in the
garden. He asked me to go. A heavy dew has refreshed the flowers. The
peaches are ripening."
"My darling! my darling!" again and again repeated the nurse.
"I thought it was daylight--long after sunrise. It looks dark. Is the
moon now set?"
That moon, lately risen, was gazing full and mild upon her. Floating in
deep blue space, it watched her unclouded.
"Then it is not morning? I am not at the cottage? Who is this? I see a
shape at my bedside."
"It is myself--it is your friend--your nurse--your---- Lean your head on
my shoulder. Collect yourself." In a lower tone--"O God, take pity! Give
_her_ life, and _me_ strength! Send me courage! Teach me words!"
Some minutes passed in silence. The patient lay mute and passive in the
trembling arms, on the throbbing bosom of the nurse.
"I am better now," whispered Caroline at last, "much better. I feel
where I am. This is Mrs. Pryor near me. I was dreaming. I talk when I
wake up from dreams; people often do in illness. How fast your heart
beats, ma'am! Do not be afraid."
"It is not fear, child--only a little anxiety, which will pass. I have
brought you some tea, Cary. Your uncle made it himself. You know he says
he can make a better cup of tea than any housewife can. Taste it. He is
concerned to hear that you eat so little; he would be glad if you had a
better appetite."
"I am thirsty. Let me drink."
She drank eagerly.
"What o'clock is it, ma'am?" she asked.
"Past nine."
"Not later? Oh! I have yet a long night before me. But the tea has made
me strong. I will sit up."
Mrs. Pryor raised her, and arranged her pillows.
"Thank Heaven! I am not always equally miserable, and ill, and hopeless.
The afternoon has been bad since Hortense went; perhaps the evening may
be better. It is a fine night, I think? The moon shines clear."
"Very fine--a perfect summer night. The old church-tower gleams white
almost as silver."
"And does the churchyard look peaceful?"
"Yes, and the garden also. Dew glistens on the foliage."
"Can you see many long weeds and nettles amongst the graves? or do they
look turfy and flowery?"
"I see closed daisy-heads gleaming like pearls on some mounds. Thomas
has mown down the dock-leaves and rank grass, and cleared all away."
"I always like that to be done; it soothes one's mind to see the place
in order. And, I dare say, within the church just now that moonlight
shines as softly as in my room. It will fall through the east window
full on the Helstone monument. When I close my eyes I seem to see poor
papa's epitaph in black letters on the white marble. There is plenty of
room for other inscriptions underneath."
"William Farren came to look after your flowers this morning. He was
afraid, now you cannot tend them yourself, they would be neglected. He
has taken two of your favourite plants home to nurse for you."
"If I were to make a will, I would leave William all my plants; Shirley
my trinkets--except one, which must not be taken off my neck; and you,
ma'am, my books." After a pause--"Mrs. Pryor, I feel a longing wish for
something."
"For what, Caroline?"
"You know I always delight to hear you sing. Sing me a hymn just now.
Sing that hymn which begins,--
'Our God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
Our refuge, haven, home!'"
Mrs. Pryor at once complied.
No wonder Caroline liked to hear her sing. Her voice, even in speaking,
was sweet and silver clear; in song it was almost divine. Neither flute
nor dulcimer has tones so pure. But the tone was secondary, compared to
the expression which trembled through--a tender vibration from a feeling
heart.
The servants in the kitchen, hearing the strain, stole to the stair-foot
to listen. Even old Helstone, as he walked in the garden, pondering over
the unaccountable and feeble nature of women, stood still amongst his
borders to catch the mournful melody more distinctly. Why it reminded
him of his forgotten dead wife, he could not tell; nor why it made him
more concerned than he had hitherto been for Caroline's fading girlhood.
He was glad to recollect that he had promised to pay Wynne, the
magistrate, a visit that evening. Low spirits and gloomy thoughts were
very much his aversion. When they attacked him he usually found means to
make them march in double-quick time. The hymn followed him faintly as
he crossed the fields. He hastened his customary sharp pace, that he
might get beyond its reach.
"Thy word commands our flesh to dust,--
'Return, ye sons of men;'
All nations rose from earth at first,
And turn to earth again.
"A thousand ages in Thy sight
Are like an evening gone--
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising sun.
"Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly, forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.
"Like flowery fields, the nations stand,
Fresh in the morning light;
The flowers beneath the mower's hand
Lie withering ere 'tis night.
"Our God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Be Thou our guard while troubles last--
O Father, be our home!"
"Now sing a song--a Scottish song," suggested Caroline, when the hymn
was over--"'Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon.'"
Again Mrs. Pryor obeyed, or essayed to obey. At the close of the first
stanza she stopped. She could get no further. Her full heart flowed
over.
"You are weeping at the pathos of the air. Come here, and I will comfort
you," said Caroline, in a pitying accent. Mrs. Pryor came. She sat down
on the edge of her patient's bed, and allowed the wasted arms to
encircle her.
"You often soothe me; let me soothe you," murmured the young girl,
kissing her cheek. "I hope," she added, "it is not for me you weep?"
No answer followed.
"Do you think I shall not get better? I do not feel _very_ ill--only
weak."
"But your mind, Caroline--your mind is crushed. Your heart is almost
broken; you have been so neglected, so repulsed, left so desolate."
"I believe grief is, and always has been, my worst ailment. I sometimes
think if an abundant gush of happiness came on me I could revive yet."
"Do you wish to live?"
"I have no object in life."
"You love me, Caroline?"
"Very much--very truly--inexpressibly sometimes. Just now I feel as if I
could almost grow to your heart."
"I will return directly, dear," remarked Mrs. Pryor, as she laid
Caroline down.
Quitting her, she glided to the door, softly turned the key in the lock,
ascertained that it was fast, and came back. She bent over her. She
threw back the curtain to admit the moonlight more freely. She gazed
intently on her face.
"Then, if you love me," said she, speaking quickly, with an altered
voice; "if you feel as if, to use your own words, you could 'grow to my
heart,' it will be neither shock nor pain for you to know that _that_
heart is the source whence yours was filled; that from _my_ veins issued
the tide which flows in _yours_; that you are _mine_--my daughter--my
own child."
"Mrs. Pryor----"
"My own child!"
"That is--that means--you have adopted me?"
"It means that, if I have given you nothing else, I at least gave you
life; that I bore you, nursed you; that I am your true mother. No other
woman can claim the title; it is _mine_."
"But Mrs. James Helstone--but my father's wife, whom I do not remember
ever to have seen, she is my mother?"
"She _is_ your mother. James Helstone was _my_ husband. I say you are
_mine_. I have proved it. I thought perhaps you were all his, which
would have been a cruel dispensation for me. I find it is _not_ so. God
permitted me to be the parent of my child's mind. It belongs to me; it
is my property--my _right_. These features are James's own. He had a
fine face when he was young, and not altered by error. Papa, my darling,
gave you your blue eyes and soft brown hair; he gave you the oval of
your face and the regularity of your lineaments--the outside _he_