Part 26 (2/2)
”Where are you going, Miss Huntingdon? Indeed, you must sit down.”
”Russell, you have brought him home; where is he?”
Without waiting for an answer, she walked down the hall, and paused suddenly at the sight of the still form resting on a grey travelling-blanket, with a lantern at its head, and an elderly man, a stranger, sitting near, keeping watch. Russell came to her side, and, drawing his arm around her, made her lean upon him. He felt the long, long lingering shudder which shook the elegant, queenly figure; then she slipped down beside the rigid sleeper, and smoothed back from the fair brow the dripping, curling, auburn hair.
”Hugh, my cousin! my playmate! s.n.a.t.c.hed away in an hour from the life you loved so well. Ah! the curse of our house has fallen upon you. It is but the beginning of the end. Only two of us are left, and we, too, shall soon be caught up to join you.”
She kissed the icy lips which a few hours ago had pressed hers so warmly, and, rising, walked up and down the long hall. Russell once more approached her.
”Are you entirely alone?”
”Yes, except the servants. Oh, Russell! how am I to break this to my father? He loves that boy better than everything else; infinitely better than he ever loved me. How shall I tell him that Hugh is dead--dead?”
”A messenger has already gone to inform him of what has happened, and this distressing task will not be yours. Herbert Blackwell and I were riding together, on our return from T----, when we reached the ford where the disaster occurred. Finding that all our efforts to resuscitate were useless, he turned back, and went to your father's plantation to break the sad intelligence to him.”
His soothing, tender tone touched some chord deep in her strange nature, and unshed tears gathered for the first time in her eyes.
”As you have no friend near enough to call upon at present, I will, if you desire it, wake the servants, remain, and do all that is necessary until morning.”
”If you please, Russell; I shall thank you very much.”
As her glance fell upon her cousin's gleaming face, her lip fluttered, and she turned away and sat down on one of the sofas in the parlour, dropping her face in her hands. A little while after, the light of a candle streamed in, and Russell came with a cus.h.i.+on from the library lounge, and his warm cloak. He wrapped the latter carefully about the drooping form, and would have placed her head on the silken pillow; but she silently resisted without looking up, and he left her. It was a vigil which she never forgot.
The fire had died out entirely, the curtains were drawn back to let in the day; on the library table the startling glare of white linen showed the outlines of the cold young sleeper, and Russell slowly paced the floor, his arms crossed, as was their habit, and his powerful form unweariedly erect.
She stood by the table half-irresolute, then folded down the sheet, and exposed the handsome, untroubled face. She studied it long and quietly, and with no burst of emotion laid her flowers against his cheek and mouth, and scattered the geraniums over his pulseless heart.
”I begged him not to start yesterday, and he answered that he would go, if the stars fell and judgment day overtook him. Sometimes we are prophets unawares. His star has set--his day has risen! Have mercy on his soul! oh, my G.o.d!”
The voice was low and even, but wonderfully sweet, and in the solemn morning light her face showed itself grey and bloodless; no stain of colour on the still lips, only the blue cord standing out between the brow, sure signs of a deep distress which found no vent. Russell felt a crus.h.i.+ng weight lifted from his heart; he saw that she had ”loved her cousin cousinly--no more”; and his face flushed when she looked across the table at him, with grateful but indescribably melancholy eyes, which had never been closed during that night of horror.
”I must now relieve you, Russell, from your friendly watch. Few would have acted as you have done, and for all your generous kindness to poor Hugh I thank you most earnestly as well for my father as myself. The day may come, perhaps, when I shall be able to prove my grat.i.tude, and the sincerity of my friends.h.i.+p, which has never wavered since we were children together.
Until that day, farewell Russell; but believe that I rejoice to hear of your successes.”
She held out her hand, and as he took it in his, which trembled violently, he felt, even then, that there was no quiver in the icy-white fingers, and that his name rippled over her lips as calmly as that of the dead had done just before. She endured his long, searching gaze, like any other Niobe, and he dropped the little pearly hand and quitted the room. At ten o'clock Mr. Huntingdon returned, and, with his hat drawn over his eyes, went straight to the library. He kissed the face of the dead pa.s.sionately and his sob and violent burst of sorrow told his child of his arrival. She lifted her rigid face, and extended her arms pleadingly.
”Father! father! here, at least, you will forgive me!”
He turned from her sternly, and answered, with bitter emphasis--
”I will not! But for _you_, he would have been different, and this would never have happened.”
”Father, I have asked for love and pardon for the last time.”
She bent down and kissed her cousin, and, with a hard, bitter expression in her countenance, went up to her own room, locking out Paragon and old Nellie, who followed cautiously at her heels.
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