Part 40 (1/2)

I stayed awake all night, and early in the morning went downstairs. I entered mother's room. I felt anxious about her, and yet not anxious.

The room was very still, and very cool and fresh. The windows were open and the blinds were up; mother always liked to sleep so, and the lovely summer air was filling the room, and there was a scent of heliotrope and roses from the flowering plants on the verandah. Mother herself was lying still as still could be on her bed. Her eyes were shut, and one of her dear white hands was lying outside the coverlet.

It was partly open, as though some one had recently clasped it and then let it go.

I went up to the bedside and looked down at mother. One glance at her face told me all. Some one _had_ clasped her hand, but he had not let it go. Hand in hand my father and mother had gone away, out through that open window, away and away, upward where the stars are and the Golden Gates stand open, and they had gone in together to the Land where there is no Death.

CHAPTER XXVII

TOO LATE

On the evening of mother's funeral, I was sitting in the little room.

I had the little room quite to myself, Jane had arranged that. I had gone through, I thought, every phase of emotion, and I was not feeling anything just then; I was sitting quiet, in a sort of stupor. The days which had intervened between mother's death and her funeral had been packed full of events. People had come and gone. Many kind words had been said to me. Mr. Fanning had arrived, and had taken my hand once again and kissed it, and looked with unutterable sorrow into my eyes; and then, seeing that I could not bear his presence, had gone away, and Mrs. Fanning had opened her arms, and taken me to her heart, and sobbed on my neck, but I could not shed a tear in return; and Captain and Mrs. Furlong had been more than kind, and more than good; and the d.u.c.h.ess had arrived one morning and gone into the room where mother lay (that is, what was left of mother), and had sobbed, oh, so bitterly, holding mother's cold hand, and kissing her cheek; and then she had turned to me, and said--

”You must come home with me, Westenra, you must come away from here, you are my charge now.”

But I refused to leave mother, and I even said--

”You neglected her while she was alive, and now you want to take me away from her, from the last I shall ever see of her beloved face.”

”I could not come; I did not dare to,” said the d.u.c.h.ess, ”it was on account of Jim. I have been grieving for Jim, and I thought I should have let his death out to her; so I had to stay away, but my heart was aching, and when I heard that she--that she had gone--I”--and then the d.u.c.h.ess buried her face in her hands, and sobbed, oh, so bitterly. But I could not shed a tear.

The d.u.c.h.ess and the Duke both went to the funeral, which made a great impression on all the guests in the boarding-house; and Lady Thesiger went; I saw her at a little distance, as I stood close to mother's grave; but all these things were over, and father and mother were together again. That was my only comfort, and I sat in the little room, and was glad that I could not suffer much more.

Into the midst of my meditations there came a brisk voice, the door was opened suddenly, there was a waft of fresh air, and Lady Thesiger stood near me.

”You are to come with me at once, Westenra,” she said, ”the carriage is at the door, and Miss Mullins, and that good soul, Mrs. Fanning, are packing your things. You are to come right away from here to-night.”

I did not want to go.

I said, ”Please leave me, Jasmine, I cannot talk to you now.”

”You need not talk,” said Jasmine Thesiger, ”but come you must.”

I opposed her as best I could; but I was weak and tired, and half stunned, and she was all life and energy; and so it came to pa.s.s, that in less than an hour, I found myself driving away in her luxurious little brougham to her house in Mayfair. She gave me a pretty room, and was very kind to me.

”I'll leave you alone, you know,” she said; ”I don't want to worry you in any way, but you must not stay at the boarding-house any longer.

Your mother is dead, and you must come back to your own set.”

”I can never come back to my own set,” I answered; ”or rather, my set is no longer yours, Jasmine; I have stepped down for ever.”

”That is folly, and worse than folly,” she replied.

She came and sat with me constantly and talked. She talked very well.

She did her utmost, all that woman could possibly do, to soothe my trouble, and to draw me out, and be good to me; but I was in a queer state, and I did not respond to any of her caresses. I was quite dazed and stupid. After a fortnight I came downstairs to meals just as usual, and I tried to speak when I was spoken to, but the cloud on my spirit never lifted for a single moment.

It was now the middle of July, and Jasmine and her husband were talking of their summer trip. They would go away to Scotland, and they wanted me to go with them. I said I would rather not, but that fact did not seem to matter in the very least. They wanted me to go; they had it all arranged. I declared that I must go back to Jane to the boarding-house, but they said that for the present I belonged to them.

I thought to myself with a dull ache, which never rose to absolute pain, how soon they would give me up, when they knew that I was engaged to Albert Fanning. I had not mentioned this fact yet, though it was on the tip of my tongue often and often. Still I kept it to myself. No one knew of our engagement but Jane Mullins, who, of course, guessed it, and Mrs. Fanning and Albert himself. I respected the Fannings very much for keeping my secret so faithfully, and I respected them still more for not coming to see me.