The “few days” spoken of by Mr. Duffham, were slowly passing. There was not much difference to be observed in Selina; except that her voice grew weaker. She could only use it at intervals. But her face had a beautiful look of peace upon it, just as though she were three parts in heaven. I have heard Duffham say so many a time since; I, Johnny Ludlow.
On the fifth day she was so much better that it seemed little short of a miracle. They found her in the Pine Room early, up and dressed: when Holt went in to light the fire, she was looking over the two books that lay on the round table. One of them was the Bible; the other was a translation of the German tale “Sintram,” which Francis had brought her when he came down the last summer. The story had taken hold of her imagination, and she knew it nearly by heart.
Down went Holt, and told them that the mistress (for, contradictory though it may seem, Selina had been always accorded that title) had taken a “new lease of life,” and was getting well. Becca, astonished, went stalking up: perhaps she was afraid it might be true. Selina had “Sintram” in her hand as she sat: her eyes looked bright, her cheeks pink, her voice was improved.
“Oh,” said Becca. “What have you left your bed for at this early hour?”
“I feel so well,” Selina answered with a smile, letting the book lie open on the table. “Won’t you shake hands with me?—and—and kiss me?”
Now Becca had never kissed her in all the years they had lived together, and she did not seem to care about beginning now. “I’ll go down and beat you up an egg and a spoonful of wine,” said she, just touching the tips of Selina’s fingers, in response to the held-out hand: and, with that, went away.
Stephen was the only one who did not pay the Pine Room a visit that day. He heard of the surprising change while he was feeding the pigs: for Becca went out and told him. Stephen splashed some wash over the side of the trough, and gave a little pig a smack with the bucket, and that was all his answer. Old Radcliffe sat an hour in the room; but he never spoke all the time: so his company could not be considered as much.
Selina crept as far as the window, and looked out on the bare pines and the other dreary trees. Most trees are dreary in November. Francis saw a shiver take her as she stood, leaning on the window-frame; and he went to give her his arm and bring her back again. They were by themselves then.
“A week, or so, of this improvement, mother, and you will be as you used to be,” said he cheerfully, seating her on the sofa and stirring up the fire. “We shall have our home together yet.”
She turned her face full on his, as he sat down by her; a half-questioning, half-wondering look in her eyes.
“Not in this world, Francis. Surely you are not deceived!” and his over-sanguine heart went down like lead.
“It is but the flickering of the spirit before it finally quits the weary frame; just as you may have seen the flame shoot up from an expiring candle,” she continued. “The end is very near now.”
A spasm of pain rose in his throat. She took his hands between her own feeble ones.
“Don’t grieve, Francis; don’t grieve for me! Remember what my life has been.”
He did remember it. He remembered also the answer Duffham gave when he had inquired what malady it was his mother was dying of. “A broken heart.”
“Don’t forget, Francis—never forget—that it is a journey we must enter on, sooner or later.”
“An uncertain and unknown journey at the best!” he said. “You have no fear of it?”
“Fear! No, but I had once.”
She spoke the words in a low, sweet tone, and pointed with a smile to the book that still lay open on the table. Francis’s eyes fell on the page.
“When death is drawing near,
And thy heart shrinks with fear,
And thy limbs fail,
Then raise thy hands and pray
To Him who cheers the way
Through the dark vale.
“Seest thou the eastern dawn?
Hears’t thou, in the red morn,
The angel’s song?
Oh! lift thy drooping head,
Thou who in gloom and dread
Hast lain so long.
“Death comes to set thee free;
Oh! meet him cheerily,
As thy true friend;
And all thy fears shall cease,
And in eternal peace
Thy penance end.”
Francis sat very still, struggling a little with that lump in his throat. She leaned forward, and let her head rest upon him, just as she had done the other day when he first came in. His emotion broke loose then.
“Oh, mother, what shall I do without you?”
“You will have God,” she whispered.
Still all the morning she kept up well; talking of this and that, saying how much of late the verses, just quoted, had floated in her mind and become a reality to her; showing Holt a slit that had appeared in the table-cover and needed darning: telling Francis his pocket-handkerchiefs looked yellow and should be bleached. It might have been thought she was only going out to tea at Church Dykely, instead of entering on the other journey she had told of.
“Have you been giving her anything?” demanded Stephen, casting his surly eyes on Francis as they sat opposite to each other at dinner in the parlour. “Dying people can’t spurt up in this manner without drugs to make ’em.”
Francis did not deign to answer. Stephen projected his fork, and took a potato out of the dish. Frank went upstairs when the meal was over. He had left his mother sitting on the sofa, comparatively well. He found her lying on the bed in the next room, grappling with death. She lifted her feeble arms to welcome him, and a ray of joyous light shone on her face. Francis made hardly one step of it to the bed.
“Oh, my darling, it will be all right!” she breathed. “I have prayed for you, and I know—I know I have been heard. You will be helped to put away that evil habit; temptation may assail, but it will not finally overcome you. And, Francis, when–” Her voice failed.
“I no longer hear what you say, mother,” cried Francis in an agony.
“Yes, yes,” she repeated, as if in answer to something he had said. “Beware of Stephen.”
The hands and face alike fell. Francis rang the bell violently, and Holt came up. All was over.
Stephen attended the funeral with the others. Grumbling wofully at having to do it, because it involved a new suit of black clothes. “They’ll be ready for the old man, though,” was his consoling reflection: “he won’t be long.”
He was even quicker than Stephen thought. On the very day week that they had come in from leaving Selina in the grave, Mr. Radcliffe was lying as lifeless as she was. A seizure carried him off. Francis was summoned again from London before he had well got back to it. Stephen could not, at such a season, completely ignore him.
He did not foresee the blow that was to come thundering down. When Mr. Radcliffe’s will came to be opened, it was found that his property was equally divided between the two sons, half and half: Stephen of course inheriting the Torr; and Squire Todhetley being appointed trustee for Francis. “And I earnestly beg of him to accept the trust,” ran the words, “for the sake of Selina’s son.”
Francis caught the glare of Stephen as they were read out. It was of course Stephen himself, but it looked more like a savage wild-cat. That warning of his mother’s came into Francis’s mind with a rush.
II
It