Fated to Be Free Part 59

"It was a very affecting scene, as ye may suppose, and my first words were, 'Who is to tell this to Mr. Mortimer?' They said your brother has already gone to fetch him and prepare him. Well, I knew everything that was in the house, and where it was kept; so I'm thankful to think I was of use, and could help the new governess and the strange servants.

"Dorothea and Mrs. Henfrey soon came in, and by the time John arrived all the invalids had been carried up-stairs, and Johnnie had begun to show signs of consciousness.

"John was as white as chalk. He was rather strange at first; he said in a commanding, peremptory way, that he wouldn't be spoken to; he wouldn't hear a word; he was not ready. Everybody stood round, till Dorothea disobeyed him; she said, 'They are all living, dear Mr. Mortimer;' and then Giles got him to sit down, and they gave him some water to drink.

"He then noticed Dr. Limpsy, who had come down, and asked if any of them were in danger, and the doctor said yes--one. So he said he prayed G.o.d it was not his eldest son: he could bear anything but that. And yet when the doctor said he had every hope that Johnnie would do well, but he had great fears for the little Anastasia, he burst into tears, poor man, and said that of all his children she would be the hardest to spare. But I need not tell ye we did not remind him of the inconsistency, and were glad to think he was not to lose the one he set his heart most upon. And after that he was perfectly himself and more composed than anybody, which is a wonder, for such a catalogue of broken bones and sprains and contusions as came to light as the doctors examined further, was enough to disturb anybody's courage. Giles sat up with Johnnie all night; indeed n.o.body went to bed. John was by Nancy, and in the morning they spoke hopefully of her. Johnnie's first words were about his father; he couldn't bear his father near him, because now and then he was surprised into shouting out with pain, and he wouldn't have John distressed with his noise. He was nothing like so well as we had hoped this morning; but still the doctors say there is no danger. He got a kick from the horse when he was down, and he thinks he fainted with the pain. When John came down to get a little breakfast he was very much cheered to have a better account than he had expected of Nancy, and he made the remark that ye would be sorry to hear of this; so I said I would write, which I am doing, sitting beside little Bertram, who is asleep.--I am

"Your mother's affectionate aunt, and always affectionately yours,

"CHRISTIAN GRANT."

Valentine read the letter, and thought that if it had not been for two or three picnic parties that he had on hand, he would have gone down to his old home, to see whether he could be of use to John Mortimer. He wrote to him, and resolved to wait a day or two; but he heard nothing till after the succeeding Sunday; then a telegram came from Emily:--"Two of John's children are extremely ill. I think your presence might be useful."

Emily had come home then.

Valentine set forth at once, and reached John Mortimer's house in the afternoon. A doctor's carriage stood at the door; a strange lady--evidently a nurse--pa.s.sed through the hall; people were quietly moving about, but they seemed too anxious, and too much occupied to observe him.

At last Emily came down.

"Is Johnnie worse?" asked Valentine.

"Yes; but I wanted you to help us with John. Oh, such a disaster! On the third night after the accident, just before I arrived--for Dorothea had sent for me--every one in the house was greatly tired; but Johnnie and Anastasia were both thought better; so much better that the doctors said if there was no change during the night, they should consider dear little Nancy quite out of danger. Giles and Dorothea had gone home. The nurse sent for was not come. John knew how fatigued the whole household was, and all who were sitting up. He had not been able to take any sleep himself, and he was restlessly pacing up and down in the garden, watching and listening under the open windows. It was very hot.

"He fancied about three o'clock that there had been a long silence in Anastasia's room. She was to have nourishment frequently. He stole up-stairs, found the person with her asleep from fatigue, gave the child some jelly himself, and then finding her medicine, as he supposed, ready poured out in the wine-gla.s.s, he gave it to her, and discovered almost instantly a mistake. The sad imprudence had been committed of pouring the lotion for the child's temples into a wine-gla.s.s, to save the trouble of ringing for a saucer. The child was almost out of danger before that terrible night; but when I came home there was scarcely a hope of her life, and her father was almost distracted. I mean that, though he seems perfectly calm, never loses his self-control, he is very often not able to command his attention so as to answer when they speak to him, and he cannot rest a moment. He spent the whole of last night wandering up and down the garden, leaning on St. George's arm. He cannot eat nor occupy himself, and the doctors begin to be uneasy about him.

Oh, it is such a misfortune!

"And Johnnie is very ill," continued Emily, tears glittering on her eyelashes; "but John seems to take it all with perfect composure.

Everything else is swallowed up in his distress of mind for what he has unfortunately done. If the child dies, I really think he will not get over it."

Some one called Emily, and she pa.s.sed up-stairs again. Valentine turned and saw John near him; he came forward, but attempted no greeting. "I thought I might be of use, John," he said, as if they had seen one another but the day before. "Is there anything I can do for you over at the town?"

Valentine was a little daunted at first at the sight of him; his face was so white and he showed so plainly the oppression that weighed down his soul by the look in his eyes; they were a little raised, and seemed as if they could not rest on anything near at hand.

Valentine repeated his words, and was relieved when John roused himself, and expressed surprise and pleasure at seeing him. He sent Valentine to one of his clerks for some papers to be signed, gave him other directions, and was evidently the better for his presence.

It was not without many strange sensations that Valentine found himself again in that room where he had spent such happy hours, and which was so connected with his recollections of his old uncle. The plunge he had taken into the sweet waters of prosperity and praise had made him oblivious of some things that now came before his thoughts again with startling distinctness; but on the whole he felt pleasure in going back to the life that he had elected to leave, and was very glad to forget John's face in doing what he could to help him.

When he returned to the house John had commenced his restless walk again. Swan was walking beside him, and he was slightly leaning his hand on the old man's shoulder, as if to steady himself.

Valentine drew near.

"And you are sure he said nothing more?" John was saying in the low inward tone of fatigue and exhaustion.

"No, sir. 'Tell Mr. Mortimer,' says he, 'that his son is considerable better,' and he told Mrs. Walker--I heard him say it--that the blessed little one was no worse, not a morsel worse."

Valentine paused and heard John speak again in that peculiar tone--"I have no hope, Swan."

"I wouldn't give up, sir, if I was you: allers hold on to hope, sir."

"I cannot stand the strain much longer," he continued, as if he had not listened, "but sometimes--my thoughts are often confused--but sometimes I feel some slight relief in prayer."

"Ay, sir," answered Swan, "the Scripture says, 'Knock, and it shall be opened to you,' and I've allers thought it was mighty easier for one that begs to go and knock there than anywhere else, for in that house the Master opens the door himself."

CHAPTER x.x.xI.

A WOMAN'S SYMPATHY.

"Midsummer night, not dark, not light.

Dusk all the scented air, I'll e'en go forth to one I love, And learn how he doth fare.

O the ring, the ring, my dear, for me, The ring was a world too fine, I wish it had sunk in a forty-fathom sea, Or ever thou mad'st it mine.

"Soft falls the dew, stars tremble through, Where lone he sits apart, Would I might steal his grief away To hide in mine own heart.

Would, would 'twere shut in yon blossom fair, The sorrow that bows thy head, Then--I would gather it, to thee unaware, And break my heart in thy stead.

"That charmed flower, far from thy bower, I'd bear the long hours through, Thou should'st forget, and my sad breast The sorrows twain should rue.

O sad flower, O sad, sad ring to me.

The ring was a world too fine; And would it had sunk in a forty-fathom sea, Ere the morn that made it mine."

Ten o'clock on the succeeding night. It seemed an age to John Mortimer since Valentine had met him in the hall, a night and a day that were almost a lifetime had come between; but his thoughts were not confused now. Something awful but fresh, breaking across his distracted mind, had diverted the torrent of his despairing fear lest his child should die through his mistake, and though he had bowed down his head and wept since the unexpected loss of another, those were healing tears, for with them came for a time escape from the rending strain that was breaking him down.

A sudden noise, when all was so quiet, and some one running down the garden, had startled him.

He tried to recall it. Valentine was with him, having just come back from the town, and one of the doctors was coming up; he took him by the hand. Other people were about him before he had time to think. Some of them were in tears. No, it was not Anastasia; he recollected how they kept telling him that it was not Anastasia, and then that they wished him to leave the house, though she was still in such imminent danger--leave the house and go to the inn. He could not receive a new thought suddenly. Why should he go to the inn? He was not anxious about his little Janie; he had not seen her for two or three days, but he could not leave the house now.

And yet he saw that he must do it. He was walking among the others to a carriage in the yard. He believed nothing; it was only as they drove along that he could understand the doctor's words--a change. They had feared that there might be an internal injury; he was to remember that they had mentioned to him some symptoms which should have made him aware of their solicitude. All very slowly, very cautiously said, but till he saw his child he did not believe a word of it.

The little face looked restless and troubled. Dorothea was sitting at her side fanning her. "Dear papa's come," she said, and then the child looked gravely satisfied, and for a long time she seemed to derive a quiet satisfaction from gazing at him. Then, by slow degrees, she fell into a deep sleep. He was so thankful to see it, and yet no one comforted him with any hopeful words. And it must have been a long time, for all the west was orange when some one woke him from an exhausted doze, his first dream since his great misfortune.

All his children were well again. They were all present but Janie.

Anastasia was sitting on his knees, rosy and smiling. "Did she know," he seemed to ask her, "what her poor father had done to her?" and while he felt this peace and joy of recovering her, some one touched his arm, and the dream was gone. He started and woke. Janie, yes, little Janie was there. "Do you want me, my darling?" were his first words, before he had quite dismissed the delusive comfort of that dream.

A remarkable, a perfectly indescribable change had come over the little face, it looked so wise. "You'd better kiss me now," she said, with a wistful, quaint composure.

"Yes, my treasure."

"I can't say my prayers to-night, papa," she presently added, "I suppose you'll have to say them for me." And before he could believe that he must part with her she was gone.

Little Janie, his little Janie. As he sat in the dusk that night he repeated her name many, many times, and sometimes added that she was his favourite child, the only one who in character and mind resembled her mother.

She was a quaint, methodical little creature. She had kept an account-book, and he had found it, with all its pretty, and now most pathetic little entries. He had put it in his breast-pocket, and his hand sought it every few minutes as he sat in the long dusk of the midsummer night. This was the first gap in his healthy, beautiful family. He felt it keenly, but a man who has six children left does not break his heart when he has to give one of them back to G.o.d.

No; but he was aware that his heart was breaking, and that now and then there came intervals in his sleepless nights and days when he did not feel at all or think at all. Sometimes for a few minutes he could not see. After these intervals of dull, amazed quiescence, when he was stupid and cold even to the heart, there were terrible times when he seemed to rouse himself to almost preternatural consciousness of the things about him, when the despair of the situation roused up like a tiger, and took hold of him and shook him body and mind.

It was true, quite true, his carelessness (but then he had been so worn out with watching), his fatal mistake, his heartless mistake (and yet he would almost have given his own life for his children) had brought him down to this slough of despond. There was no hope, the doctors never told him of any, and he knew he could not bear this much longer.

There are times when some of us, left alone to pull out again our past, and look at it in the light of a present, made remorseless and cruel with the energy that comes of pain, are determined to blame ourselves not only for the present misfortune, but to go back and back, and see in everything that has gone wrong with us how, but for our own fault, perversity, cowardice, stupidity, we might have escaped almost all the ills under which we now groan.