Part 13 (2/2)

Minnie was sitting beside Mabel's bed on the third day of the holidays, when she heard a step outside the door. The handle was turned noiselessly, and Mona came in on tip-toes, fearful of creating the least sound.

”Miss Chartres didn't tell me you were here,” she said, her voice trembling. ”How is she?”

”I think the fever isn't quite so bad--she hasn't been wandering so much this afternoon.”

Mabel had lain almost motionless all this time, but now her pale lips began to move, although for some moments no sound issued from them. Then she began to speak in a voice so thin and weak that Mona could hardly recognize it.

For some time they could make nothing of her words, and only tried to soothe her, but after a while it became clear to them that she was repeating something which sounded like poetry. Still they could make nothing out of it, for sometimes several words would be lost from a line, and occasionally a whole line would be repeated by those pale lips without a sound.

At length Minnie caught a whole line. What the words were which went before she could not tell, but the words she caught came clear and distinct:

”It went up Single, Echoless,--'My G.o.d I am deserted.'”

The words ”Single, Echoless” were uttered with a strange sort of triumphant emphasis which struck both the girls, and then the feeble voice went on more brokenly even than before with a few lines more, and then suddenly ceased.

Minnie repeated the line over.

”I wonder what it is from,” she said. ”I am sure I have read it often, but I cannot remember where.”

”I can't tell just at this minute either,” remarked Mona, ”I know it perfectly well though. If we could only get hold of it, reading it to her might do her any amount of good.”

”That is just what I was thinking about,” returned Minnie, ”I wish we could find it.”

”I've got it!” exclaimed Mona, at last, with a suppressed shriek of triumph. ”It's in Mrs. Browning.”

He looked very grave indeed on this occasion which was his third visit that day. A crisis, he said, would probably take place that night; he promised to come again before the time he expected it would occur; but held but very little hope as to its ultimate issue.

When he arrived, Mabel was in a state of high delirium, and raved in a way which made Minnie pale with terror. After about half-an-hour of wild, disconnected raving, she became a little quieter, and at last settled down to the old habit of repeating verses--verses which Minnie now recognised as belonging to Mrs. Browning's poem on Cowper's Grave.

She drew the doctor out into an adjoining room and explained to him the idea which had occurred to her in connection with Mabel's constant repet.i.tion of this poem, asking if he did not think it might have some good effect.

”Well,” he said, ”I must tell you plainly that I am afraid it cannot have any good effect, but at any rate it cannot have any bad effect, and she is only wearing herself out more quickly as it is.”--”Yes,” he continued more kindly, noticing for the first time how young she was, and how terribly in earnest, ”read it to her by all means. It will do _you_ good, and it cannot do her harm.”

She thanked him with tears in her eyes, and they both went back into the sick-chamber together.

She had brought the book with her, so, turning at once to the place, she began to read in a low, soft tone, with slow and measured accents, well-suited to the subject and the measure as well as the purpose she had in view.

At first it produced no visible effect, but she gradually became quieter as Minnie proceeded and the hopes of the watchers rose. She did not attempt to follow it at all till the line Minnie had caught so distinctly was reached, and then she repeated it after her in the same tone as before, and with the same triumphant emphasis on the words, ”Single, Echoless.”

Then she went on with the lines following along with Minnie, her voice growing gradually weaker and weaker as she proceeded:--

”It went up from the holy lips amid His lost creation That of the lost no one should use those words of desolation-- That earth worst frenzies, marring hope, might mar not hope's fruition.”

Here her voice died away, and she lay back with a long sigh of content.

”She's conscious!” exclaimed Minnie in a whisper as she closed the book, ”and the fever's gone. You said she would be safe--” and she stood with bated breath while the doctor bent over her.

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