Part 132 (2/2)
”You have been writing to George?” he observed, seeing the letter on the table. ”But it will not go to-night: it is too late.”
”It can go up by to-morrow's day mail, and he will receive it in the evening. Perhaps you will post it for me as you walk home: it will save Margery's going out.”
Lord Averil put the letter into his pocket. He stood looking at her as she lay a little back in her easy-chair, his arm resting on the mantelpiece, curious thoughts pa.s.sing through his mind. Could he do nothing for her?--to avert the fate that was threatening her? He, rich in wealth, happy now in the world's favour; she, going to the grave in sorrow, it might be in privation--_what_ could he do to help her?
There are moments when we speak out of our true heart, when the conventionality that surrounds the best of us is thrown aside, all deceit, all form forgotten. Lord Averil was a good and true man, but never better, never truer than now, when he took a step forward and bent to Maria.
”Let me have the satisfaction of doing something for you; let me try to save you!” he implored in low earnest tones. ”If that may not be, let me help to lighten your remaining hours. How can I best do it?”
She held out her hand to him: she looked up at him, the grat.i.tude she could not speak s.h.i.+ning from her sweet eyes. ”Indeed there is nothing now, Lord Averil. I wish I could thank you as you deserve for the past.”
He held her hand for some time, but she seemed weak, exhausted, and he said good night. Margery attended him to the outer gate, in spite of his desire that she should not do so, for the night air was cold and seemed to threaten snow.
”Your mistress is very ill, Margery,” he gravely said. ”She seems to be in danger.”
”I'm afraid she is, my lord. Up to the last day or two I thought she might take a turn and get over it; but since then she has grown worse with every hour. Some folks can battle out things, and some folks can't; she's one of the last sort, and she has been tried in all ways.”
Lord Averil dropped the letter into the post-office, looking mechanically at its superscription, George G.o.dolphin, Esquire. But that he was preoccupied with his own thoughts, he might have seen by the very writing how weak she was, for it was scarcely recognizable as hers.
Very, very ill she looked, as if the end were growing ominously near; and Lord Averil did not altogether like the tardy summons which the letter would convey. A night and a day yet before George could receive it. A moment's communing with himself, and then he took the path to the telegraph office, and sent off a message:
”Viscount Averil to George G.o.dolphin, Esquire.
”Your wife is very ill. Come down by first train.”
The snow came early. It was nothing like Christmas yet, and here was the ground covered with it. The skies had seemed to threaten it the previous night, but people were not prepared to find everything wearing a white aspect when they rose in the morning.
The Reverend Mr. Hastings was ill. A neglected cold was telling so greatly upon him that his daughter Rose had at length sent for Mr. Snow.
Mrs. Hastings was away for a day or two, on a visit to some friends at a distance.
Mr. Hastings sat over the fire, dreamily watching David Jekyl, awaiting the visit of Mr. Snow, and thinking his own thoughts. David was busy in the garden. He had a bit of c.r.a.pe on his old felt hat for his recently-interred father. The c.r.a.pe led the Rector's thoughts to the old man, and thence to the deprivation brought to the old man's years, the loss to the sons, through George G.o.dolphin. How many more, besides poor old Jekyl, had George G.o.dolphin ruined! himself, that reverend divine, amongst the rest!
”A good thing when the country shall be rid of him!” spoke the Rector in his bitterness. ”I would give all the comfort left in my life that Maria, for her own sake, had not linked her fate with his! But that can't be remedied now. I hope he will make her happier there, in her new home, than he has made her here!”
By which words you will gather that Mr. Hastings had no suspicion of the change in his daughter's state. It was so. Lord and Lady Averil were not alone in learning the tidings suddenly; at, as it may be said, the eleventh hour. Maria had not sent word to the Rectory that she was worse. She knew that her mother was absent, that her father was ill, that Rose was occupied; and that the change from bad to worse had come upon herself so imperceptibly, that she saw not its real danger--as was proved by her not writing to her husband. The Rector, as he sits there, has his mind full of Maria's voyage, and its discomfort: of her changed life in India: and he is saying to himself that he shall get out in the afternoon and call to see her.
The room faced the side of the house, but as Mr. Hastings sat he could catch a glimpse of the garden gate, and presently saw the well-known gig stop at it, and the surgeon descend.
”Well, and who's ill now?” cried Mr. Snow, as he let himself in at the hall-door, and thence to the room, where he took a seat in front of the Rector, examined his ailment, and gossiped at the same time, as was his wont; gossiped and grumbled.
”Ah, yes; just so: feel worse than you have felt for twenty years. You caught this cold at Thomas G.o.dolphin's funeral, and you have not chosen to pay attention to it.”
”I think I did. I felt it coming on the next day. I could not read the service in my hat, Snow, over _him_, and you know that rain was falling.
Ah! There was a sufferer! But had it not been for the calamity that fell upon him, he might not have gone to the grave quite so soon.”
”He felt it too keenly,” remarked Mr. Snow. ”And your daughter--there's another sad victim. Ah me! Sometimes I wish I had never been a doctor, when I find all that I can do in the way of treatment comes to nothing.”
”If she can only get well through the fatigues of the voyage, she may be better in India. Don't you think so? The very change from this place will put new life into her.”
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