Thelma
She spoke of things strange and new to her attendant's ears--frequently
she pronounced the names of Violet Vere and Lady Winsleigh with an
accent of horror,--then she would talk of George Lorimer and Pierre
Duprez,--and she would call for Britta often, sometimes
endearingly--sometimes impatiently.
The picture of her home in Warwickshire seemed to haunt her,--she spoke
of its great green trees, its roses, its smooth sloping lawns--then she
would begin to smile and sing again in such a weak, pitiful fashion that
Ulrika,--her stern nature utterly melted at the sight of such innocent
helpless distraction and sorrow,--could do nothing but fold the
suffering creature in her arms, and rock her to and fro soothingly on
her breast, the tears running down her cheeks the while.
And after long hours of bewilderment and anguish, Errington's child, a
boy, was born--dead. With a regretful heart, Ulrika laid out the tiny
corpse,--the withered blossom of a promised new delight, a miniature form
so fair and perfect that it seemed sheer cruelty on the part of nature
to deny it breath and motion. Thelma's mind still wandered--she was
hardly conscious of anything--and Ulrika was almost glad that this was
so. Her anxiety was very great--she could not disguise from herself that
Thelma's life was in danger,--and both she and Valdemar wrote to Sir
Philip Errington, preparing him for the worst, and urging him to come at
once,--little aware that the very night the lifeless child was born, was
the same on which he had started from Hull for Christiansund, after his
enforced waiting for the required steamer. There was nothing more to be
done now, thought Ulrika piously, but to trust in the Lord and hope for
the best. And Valdemar Svensen made with his own hands a tiny coffin for
the body of the little dead boy who was to have brought such pride and
satisfaction to his parents, and one day rowed it across the Fjord to
that secret cave where Thelma's mother lay enshrined in stone. There he
left it, feeling sure he had done well.
Ulrika asked him no questions--she was entirely absorbed in the duties
that devolved upon her, and with an ungrudging devotion strange to see
in her, watched and tended Thelma incessantly, scarcely allowing herself
a minute's space for rest or food. The idea that her present
ministration was to save her soul in the sight of the Lord, had grown
upon her, and was now rooted firmly in her mind--she never gave way to
fatigue or inattention,--every moan, every restless movement of the
suffering girl, obtained her instant and tender solicitude, and when she
prayed now, it was not for herself but for Thelma.
"Spare her, good Lord!" she would implore in the hyperbolical language
she had drawn from her study of the Scriptures--"As the lily among
thorns, so is she among the daughters! Cut her not off root and branch
from the land of the living, for her countenance is comely, and as a
bunch of myrrh which hath a powerful sweetness, even so must she surely
be to the heart of her husband! Stretch forth Thy right hand, O Lord,
and scatter healing, for the gates of death shall not prevail against
Thy power!"
Day after day she poured out petitions such as these, and with the
dogged persistency of a soldier serving Cromwell, believed that they
would be granted,--though day after day Thelma seemed to grow weaker and
weaker. She was still light-headed--her face grew thin and shadowy,--her
hands were almost transparent in their whiteness and delicacy, and her
voice was so faint as to be nearly in-audible. Sometimes Ulrika got
frightened at her appearance, and heartily wished for medical assistance
but this was not to be had. Therefore she was compelled to rely on the
efficacy of one simple remedy,--a herbal drink to allay fever,--the
virtues of which she had been taught in her youth,--this, and the
healing mercies of mother Nature together with the reserved strength of
her own constitution, were the threads on which Thelma's life hung.
Time passed on--and yet there was no news from Sir Philip. One night,
sitting beside her exhausted patient, Ulrika fancied she saw a change on
the wan face--a softer, more, peaceful look than had been there for many
days. Half in fear, half in hope, she watched,--Thelma seemed to
sleep,--but presently her large blue eyes opened with a calm yet
wondering expression in their clear depths. She turned slightly on her
pillows, and smiled faintly.
"Have I been ill?" she asked.
"Yes, my dear," returned Ulrika softly, overjoyed, yet afraid at the
girl's returning intelligence. "Very ill. But you feel better now, don't
you?"
Thelma sighed, and raising her little wasted hand, examined it
curiously. Her wedding and betrothal rings were so loose on her finger
that they would have fallen off had they been held downwards. She seemed
surprised at this, but made no remark. For some time she remained quiet,
steadfastly gazing at Ulrika, and evidently trying to make out who she
was. Presently she spoke again.
"I remember everything now," she said, slowly. "I am at home, at the
Altenfjord--and I know how I came--and also _why_ I came." Here her lips
quivered. "And I shall see my father no more, for he has gone--and I am
all--all alone in the world!" She paused--then added, "Do you think I am
dying? If so, I am very glad!"
"Hush my dear!" said Ulrika. "You mustn't talk in that way. Your husband
is coming presently--" she broke off suddenly, startled at the look of
utter despair in Thelma's eyes.
"You are wrong," she replied wearily. "He will not come--he cannot! He
does not want me any more!"
And two large tears rolled slowly down her pale cheeks. Ulrika wondered,
but forebore to pursue the subject further, fearing to excite or
distress her,--and contented herself for the present with attending to
her patient's bodily needs. She went to the fire, and began to pour out
some nourishing soup, which she always had there in readiness,--and
while she was thus engaged, Thelma's brain cleared more and more,--till
with touching directness, and a new hope flushing her face, she asked
softly and beseechingly for her child. "I forgot!" she said simply and
sweetly. "Of course I am not alone any more. Do give me my baby--I am
much better--nearly well--and I should like to kiss it."
Ulrika stood mute, taken aback by this demand. She dared not tell her
the truth--she feared its effect on the sensitive mind that had so
lately regained its balance. But while she hesitated, Thelma
instinctively guessed all she strove to hide.
"It is dead!" she cried. "Dead!--and I never knew!"
And, burying her golden head in her pillows, she broke into a passion of
convulsive sobbing. Ulrika grew positively desperate at the sound,--what
_was_ she to do? Everything seemed to go against her--she was inclined
to cry herself. She embraced the broken-hearted girl, and tried to
soothe her, but in vain. The long delirium and subsequent
weakness,--combined with the secret trouble on her mind,--had deprived
poor Thelma of all resisting power, and she wept on and on in Ulrika's
arms till nature was exhausted, and she could weep no longer. Then she
lay motionless, with closed eyes, utterly drained in body and spirit,
scarcely breathing, and, save for a shivering moan that now and then
escaped her, she seemed almost insensible. Ulrika watched her with
darkening, meditative brows,--she listened to the rush of the storm-wind
without,--it was past eleven o'clock at night. She began to count on her
fingers--it was the sixteenth day since the birth of the child,--sixteen
days exactly since she had written to Sir Philip Errington, informing
him of his wife's danger--and the danger was not yet past. Thinking over
all that had happened, and the apparent hopelessness of the case, she
suddenly took a strange idea into her head. Retiring to a distant
corner, she dropped on her knees.
"O Lord, God Almighty!" she said in a fierce whisper, "Behold, I have
been Thy servant until now! I have wrestled with Thee in prayer till I
am past all patience! If Thou wilt not hear my petition, why callest
Thou Thyself good? Is it good to crush the already fallen? Is it good to
have no mercy on the sorrowful? Wilt Thou condemn the innocent without
reason? If so, thou art not the Holy One I imagined! Send forth Thy
power now--now, while there is time! Rescue her that is lying under the
shadow of death--for how has she offended Thee that she should die?
Delay no longer, or how shall I put my trust in Thee? Send help speedily
from Thine everlasting habitations--or, behold! I do forsake Thee--and
my soul shall seek elsewhere for Eternal Justice!"
As she finished this extraordinary, half-threatening, and entirely
blasphemous petition, the boisterous gale roared wildly round the house
joining in chorus with the stormy dash of waves upon the coast--a chorus
that seemed to Ulrika's ears like the sound of fiendish and derisive
laughter.
She stood listening,--a trifle scared--yet with a sort of fanatical
defiance written on her face, and she waited in sullen patience
evidently expecting an immediate answer to her outrageous prayer. She
felt somewhat like a demagogue of the people, who boldly menaces an
all-powerful sovereign, even while in dread of instant execution. There
was a sharp patter of sleet on the window,--she glanced nervously at
Thelma, who, perfectly still on her couch, looked more like a white,
recumbent statue than a living woman. The wind shook the doors, and
whistled shrilly through the crevices,--then, as though tired of its own
wrath, surged away in hoarse murmurs over the tops of the creaking pines
towards the Fjord, and there was a short, impressive silence.
Ulrika still waited--almost holding her breath in expectation of some
divine manifestation. The brief stillness grew unbearable.. . . Hush!
What was that! Jingle--jangle--jingle--jangle!--Bells! Sledge bells
tinkling musically and merrily--and approaching swiftly, nearer--nearer!
Now the sharp trotting roofs on the hard snow--then a sudden slackening
of speed--the little metallic chimes rang slower and yet more slowly,
till with a decisive and melodious clash they stopped!
Ulrika's heart beat thickly--her face flushed--she advanced to Thelma's
bedside, hoping, fearing,--she knew not what. There was a tread of firm,
yet hurried, footsteps without--a murmur of subdued voices--a
half-suppressed exclamation of surprise and relief from Valdemar,--and
then the door of the room was hastily thrown open, and a man's tall
figure, draped in what seemed to be a garment of frozen snowflakes,
stood on the threshold. The noise startled Thelma--she opened her
beautiful, tired, blue eyes. Ah! what a divine rapture,--what a dazzling
wonder and joy flashed into them, giving them back their old lustre of
sunlight sparkling on azure sea! She sprang up in her bed and stretched
out her arms.
"Philip!" she cried sobbingly. "Philip! oh my darling! Try--try to love
me again! . . . just a little!--before I die!"
As she spoke she was clasped to his breast,--folded to his heart in that
strong, jealous, passionate embrace with which we who love, would fain
shield our nearest and dearest from even the shadow of evil--his lips
closed on hers,--and in the sacred stillness that followed, Ulrika
slipped from the room, leaving husband and wife alone together.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
"I have led her home, my love, my only friend;
There is none like her, none!
And never yet so warmly ran my blood,
And sweetly on and on,
Calming itself to the long-wished-for end,
Full to the banks, close on the promised good."
TENNYSON.
Britta was in the kitchen, dragging off her snow-wet cloak and fur