breathe softly, tread gently, for it is the chamber of the dying! the spirit is indeed on its wing, hovering on the very isthmus which separates time from eternity.
a small shaded lamp throws its subdued light upon the room, blending with the ruddier hue cast by the fire. the white, wan face of maria godolphin lies quietly on the not whiter pillow; her breath comes in short gasps, and may be heard at a distance; otherwise she is calm and still; the sweet soft eyes are open yet, and the world and its interests, so far as cognizance goes, has not closed. meta, in her black frock, dressed as she had been in the day, is lying on the bed by her mother’s side: one weak arm is thrown round the child, as if she could not part with her greatest earthly treasure; and george is sitting in a chair on the other side the bed, his elbow on the pillow, his face turned to catch every shade that may appear on that fading one, so soon to be lost to him for ever.
the silence was interrupted by the striking of the house-clock: twelve: and its strokes came through the doors of the room with preternatural loudness in the hushed stillness of midnight. margery glided in. margery and jean were keeping watch over the fire in the next room, the sitting-room, ready for any services required of them: and they knew that services for the dead as well as for the living might be wanted that night.
the doctors had paid a last visit, superfluous as they knew it to be. dr. beale had come with the departure of his dinner guests; mr. snow earlier in the evening: she was dying, they said, calmly and peacefully: and those friends who had wished to take their farewell had taken it ere they left the house, leaving her, as she wished, alone with her husband.
margery came in with a noiseless step. if margery had come in once upon the same errand which brought her now, she had come in ten times. maria turned her eyes towards her.
“she would be a sight better in bed. it has gone midnight. it can’t do any good, her lying there.”
meta partly stirred her golden curls as she moved nearer to her mother, and maria’s feeble hand tightened its clasp on the little one. george nodded; and margery went back rather in dudgeon, and gave the fire in the next room a fierce poke.
“it’s not well to let her see a mortal die. just you hold your tongue, jean, about mother and child! don’t i know it’s parting them as well as you?—but the parting must come, and before another hour is over; and i say it would be better to bring her away now. master has no more sense than a calf, or he’d send her. not he! he just gave me one of his looks, as much as to say, ‘you be off again; she isn’t coming.’”
[459]“how does she seem now?” asked jean, a tall woman, with a thin, straight figure, and an old-fashioned, large white cap.
“i saw no change. there won’t be any till the minute comes.”
on the table was a tray of cups and saucers. margery went up to them and drew two from the rest. “we may as well have a drop o’ tea now,” she said, taking up a small black tea-pot that was standing on the hob—for the grate was old-fashioned. “shall i cut you a bit of bread and butter, jean?”
“no, thank you. i couldn’t eat it.”
they sat on either side the table, the tea-cups between them. margery put the tea-pot back on the hob. jean stirred her tea noiselessly.
“i have known those, as far gone as she, rally for hours,” jean remarked, in a half-whisper.
margery shook her head. “she won’t rally. it will be only the working out of my dream. i dreamt last night——”
“don’t get talking of dreams now, margery,” interrupted jean, with a shiver. “i never like to bring dreams up when the dead are about.”
margery cast a resentful glance at her. “jean, woman, if you have laughed at my dreams once you have laughed at them a hundred times when we lived together at ashlydyat, ridiculing and saying you never could believe in such things. you know you have.”
“no more i don’t believe in ’em,” said jane, taking little sips of her hot tea. “but it’s not a pleasant subject for to-night. the child is to come to the old home, they say, to be brought up by my lady.”
margery grunted.
“shall we have you at ashlydyat again, margery?”
“now don’t you bother your head about me, jean, woman. is it a time to cast one’s thoughts about and lay out plans? let the future take care of itself.”
jean remained silent after this rebuff and attended to her tea, which she could not get sufficiently cool to drink comfortably. she had been an inferior servant to margery at ashlydyat, in a measure under her control; and she still deferred to her in manner. presently she began again.
“it’s a curious complaint that your mistress has died of, margery. leastways it has a curious name. i made bold to ask dr. beale to-night what it was, when i went to open the gate for him, and he called it—what was it?—atrophy. atrophy: that was it. they could not at all class the disease of which mrs. george godolphin had died, he said, and were content to call it atrophy for want of a better name. i took leave to say that i didn’t understand the word, and he explained that it meant a gradual wasting away of the system without apparent cause.”
margery did not reply for the moment: she was swelling with displeasure.
“margery, what is atrophy, for i don’t understand it a bit?”
“it’s rubbish,” flashed margery—“as applied to my poor dear mistress. she has died of the trouble—that she couldn’t speak of—that has eaten into her heart and cankered there—and broke it at the last. atrophy! but those doctors must put a name to everything. jean, woman, i have been with her all through it, and i tell you that it’s the [460]trouble that has killed her. she has had it on all sides, has felt it in more ways than the world gives her credit for. she never opened her lips to me about a thing—and perhaps it had been better if she had—but i have my eyes in my head, and i could see what it was doing for her. as i lay down in my clothes on this very sofa last night, for it wasn’t up to my bed i went, with her so ill, i couldn’t help thinking to myself, that if she could but have broken the ice and talked of her sorrows they might have worn off in time. it is burying the grief within people’s own breasts that kills them.”
jean was silent. margery began turning the grounds in her empty tea-cup round and round, staring dreamily at the forms they assumed.
“hark!” cried jean.
a sound was heard in the next room. margery started from her chair and softly opened the door. but it was only her master, who had gone round the bed and was leaning over meta. margery closed the door again.
george had come to the conclusion that the child would be best in bed. meta was lying perfectly still, looking earnestly at her mamma’s face, so soon, so soon to be lost to her. he drew the hair from her brow as he spoke.
“you will be very tired, meta. i think you must go to bed.”
for answer meta broke into a passionate storm of sobs. they roused maria from her passive silence.
“meta—darling,” came forth the isolated words in the difficulty of her laboured breath—“i am going away, but you will come to me. you will be sure to come to me, for god has promised. i seem to have had the promise given to me, to hold it, now, and i shall carry it away with me. i am going to heaven. when the blind was drawn up yesterday morning and i saw the snow, it made me shiver, but i said there will be no snow in heaven. meta, there will be only spring there; no sultry heat of summer, no keen winter’s cold. oh, my child! try to come to me, try always! i shall keep a place for you.”
the minutes went on: the spirit fleeting, george watching with his aching heart. soon she spoke again.
“has it struck twelve?”
“ten minutes ago.”
“then it is my birthday. i am twenty-eight to-day. it is young to die!”
young to die! yes, it was young to die: but there are some who can count time by sorrow, not by years.
“don’t grieve, george. it will pass so very soon, and you will come to me. clad in our white robes, we shall rise at the last day to eternal life, and be together for ever and for ever.”
the tears were dropping from his eyes. the grief of the present, the anguish of the parting, the remorse for the irrevocable past, in which he might have cherished her more tenderly had he foreseen this, and did not, were all too present to him. he laid his face on hers with a bitter cry.
“forgive me before you go! oh, my darling, forgive me all!”
there was no answering response, nothing but the feeble pressure of her hand as it held him there, and he started up to look at her. ah[461] no: there could never more be any response from those fading lips, never more, never more.
had the hour come? george godolphin’s heart beat quicker, and he wildly kissed her with passionate kisses—as if that would keep within her the life that was ebbing. the loving eyes gazed at him still—it was he who had the last lingering look, not meta.
but she was not to die just then: life was longer in finally departing. george—greedily watching her every breath, praying (who knows?) wild and unavailing prayers to heaven that even yet a miracle might be wrought and she spared to him—supported her head on his arm. and the minutes went on and on.
meta was very still. her sobs had first subsided into a sudden catching of the breath now and then, but that was no longer heard. maria moved uneasily, or strove to move, and looked up at george in distress; dying though she was, almost past feeling, the weight of the child’s head had grown heavy on her side. he understood and went round to move meta.
she had fallen asleep. weary with the hour, the excitement, the still watching, the sobs, sleep had stolen unconsciously upon her: her wet eyelashes were closed, her breathing was regular, her hot cheeks were crimson. “shall i take her to margery?” he whispered.
maria seemed to look approval, but her eyes followed the child as george raised her in his arms. it was impossible to mistake their yearning wish.
he carried the child round, he gently held her sleeping face to that of his wife, and the dying mother pressed her last feeble kiss upon the unanswering and unconscious lips. then he took her and gave her to margery.
the tears were in maria’s eyes when he returned to her, and he bent his face to catch the words that were evidently striving to be spoken.
“love her always, george.”
“oh, my darling, there is no need to tell it me!”
the answer seemed to have burst from him in anguish. there is no doubt that those few last hours had been of the bitterest anguish to george godolphin: he had never gone through such before—he never would go through such again. it is well, it is well that these moments can come but once in a lifetime.
he hung over her, suppressing his emotion as he best could for her sake; he wiped the death-dews from her brow, fast gathering there. her eyes never moved from him, her fingers to the last sought to entwine themselves with his. but soon the loving expression of those eyes faded into unconsciousness: they were open still, looking, as it may be, afar off: the recognition of him, her husband, the recollection of earthly things had passed away.
suddenly there was a movement of the lips, a renewal in a faint degree of strength and energy; and george strove to catch the words. her voice was dreamy; her eyes looked dreamily at him whom she would never more recognize until they should both have put on immortality.
“and the city has no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of god lightens it, and the lamb is the light——”
[462]even as she was speaking, the last words of her voice dropped, and was still. there was no sigh, there was no struggle; had meta been looking on, the child’s pulses would not have been stirred. very, very gently had the spirit taken its flight.
george godolphin let his head fall upon the pillow beside her. in his overwhelming grief for her? or in repentant prayer for himself? he alone knew. let us leave it with him!
once more, once more—i cannot help it, if you blame me for relating these things—the death-knell of all souls’ boomed out over prior’s ash. people were rising in the morning when it struck upon their ear, and they held their breath to listen: three times two, and then the quick sharp strokes rang for the recently departed. then it was for her who was known the previous night to be at the point of death! and they went out of their houses in the bleak winter’s morning, and said to each other, as they took down their shutters, that poor mrs. george godolphin had really gone at last.
poor mrs. george godolphin! ay, they could speak of her considerately, kindly, regretfully now, but did they remember how they had once spoken of her? she had gone to the grave with her pain and sorrow—she had gone with the remembrance of their severe judgment, their harsh words, which had eaten into her too-sensitive heart; she had gone away from them, to be judged by one who would be more merciful than they had been.
oh, if we could but be less harsh in judging our fellow-pilgrims! i have told you no idle tale, no false story conjured up by a plausible imagination. prior’s ash lamented her in a startled sort of manner: their consciences pricked them sorely; and they would have given something to recall her back to life, now it was too late.
they stared at each other, shutters in hand, stunned as it were, with blank faces and repentant hearts. somehow they had never believed she would really die, even the day before, when it had been talked of as all too probable, they had not fully believed it: she was young and beautiful, and it is not common for such to go. they recalled her in the several stages of her life: their rector’s daughter, the pretty child who had been born and reared among them, the graceful girl who had given her love to george godolphin, the most attractive man in prior’s ash; the faithful, modest wife, against whose fair fame never a breath of scandal had dared to come. it was all over now: she and her broken heart, her wrongs and her sorrows had been taken from their tender mercies to a land where neither wrongs nor sorrows can penetrate—where the hearts broken here by unkindness are made whole.
when meta woke in the morning it was considerably beyond her usual hour, the result probably of her late vigil. jean was in the room, not margery. a moment’s surprised stare, and then recollection flashed over her. she darted out of bed, her flushed cheeks and her bright eyes raised to jean.
“i want mamma.”
“yes, dear,” said jean evasively. “i’ll dress you, and then you shall go down.”
“where’s margery?”
[463]“she has just stepped out on an errand.”
“is mamma in her room? is she in her bed?”
“we’ll go and see presently, dear,” repeated jean with the same evasion.
the worst way that any one can take is to attempt to deceive a thoughtful, sensitive child, whose fears may be already awakened: it is certain to defeat its own ends. meta knew as well as jean did that she was being purposely deceived, that there was something to tell which was not being told. she had no very defined idea of death, but a dread came over meta that her mamma was in some manner gone out of the house, that she should never see her again: she backed from jean’s hand, dashed the door open, and flew down the stairs. jean flew after her, crying and calling.
the noise surprised george godolphin. he was in the parlour at the breakfast-table; sitting at the meal but not touching it. the consternation of prior’s ash was great, but that was as nothing in comparison with his. george godolphin was as a man bewildered. he could not realize the fact. only four and twenty hours since he had received intimation of the danger, and now she was—there. he could not realize it. though all yesterday afternoon, since his arrival, he had known there was no hope—though he had seen her die—though he had passed the hours since, lamenting her as much as he could do so in his first stunned state, yet he could not realize it. he was not casting much blame to himself: he was thinking how circumstances had worked against him and against maria. his mind was yet in a chaos, and it was from this confused state that the noise outside disturbed him. opening the door, the sight came full upon his view. the child flying down in her white night-dress, her naked feet scarcely touching the stairs, her eyes wild, her hot cheeks flaming, her golden hair entangled as she had slept.
“i want mamma,” she cried, literally springing into his arms, as if for refuge. “papa, i want mamma.”
she burst into a storm of sobs distressing to hear; she clung to him, her little arms, her whole frame trembling. george, half unmanned, sat down before the fire, and pressed her to him in his strong arms.
“bring a shawl,” he said to jean.
a warm grey shawl of chenille which maria had often lately worn upon her shoulders was found by jean, and george wrapped it round meta as she lay in his arms, and he kept her there. had margery been present, she would probably have taken the young lady away by force, and dressed her, with a reprimand: but there was only jean: and george had it all his own way.
he tried to comfort the grieved spirit; the little sobbing bosom that beat against his; but his efforts seemed useless, and the child’s cry never ceased.
“i want mamma; i want to see mamma.”
“hush, meta! mamma”—george had to pause, himself—“mamma’s gone. she——”
the words confirmed all her fears, and she strove to get off his lap in her excitement, interrupting his words. “let me go and see her,[464] papa! is she in the grave with uncle thomas? oh, let me go and see it! grandpapa will show it to me.”
how long it took to soothe her even to comparative calmness, george scarcely knew. he learnt more of meta’s true nature in that one interview than he had learnt in all her life before: and he saw that he must, in that solemn hour, speak to her as he would to a girl of twice her years.
“mamma’s gone to heaven, child; she is gone to be an angel with the great god. she would have stayed with us if she could, meta, but death came and took her. she kissed you; she kissed you, meta, with her last breath. you were fast asleep: you fell asleep by her side, and i held you to mamma for her last kiss, and soon after that she died.”
meta had kept still, listening: but now the sobs broke out again.
“why didn’t they wake me and let me see her? why did they take her away first? oh, papa, though she is dead, i want to see her; i want to see mamma.”
he felt inclined to take her into the room. maria was looking very much like herself; far more so than she had looked in the last days of life: there was nothing ghastly, nothing repulsive, as is too often the case with the dead; the sweet face of life looked scarcely less sweet now.
“mamma that was is there still, meta,” he said, indicating the next room. “the spirit is gone to heaven; you know that: the body, that which you used to call mamma, will be here yet a little while, and then it will be laid by uncle thomas, to wait for the resurrection of the last day. meta, if i should live to come home from india; that is, if i am in my native land when my time comes to die, they will lay me beside her—”
he stopped abruptly. meta had lifted her head and was looking at him with a wild, questioning expression; as if she could not at first understand or believe his words. “mamma is there?”
“yes. but she is dead now, meta; she is not living.”
“oh, take me to her! papa, take me to her!”
“listen, meta. mamma is changed, she looks cold and white, and her eyes are shut, and she does not stir. i would take you in: but i fear—i don’t know whether you would like to look at her.”
but there might be no denial now that the hope had been given; the child would have broken her heart over it. george godolphin rose; he pressed the little head upon his shoulder, and carried her to the door, the shawl well wound round her body, her warm feet hanging down. once in the room, he laid his hand upon the golden curls, to insure that the face was not raised until he saw fit that it should be, and bore her straight to the head of the bed. then, holding her in his arms very tightly that she might feel sensibly his protection, he suffered her to look full upon the white face lying there.
one glance, and meta turned and buried her head upon him; he could feel her trembling; and he began to question his own wisdom in bringing her in. another minute, and she looked back and took a longer gaze.
“that’s not mamma,” she said, bursting into tears.
george sat down on a chair close by, and laid her wet cheek against[465] his, and hid his eyes amidst her curls. his emotion had spent itself in the long night, and he thought he could control it now.
“that is mamma, meta; your mother and my dear wife. it is all that is left of her. oh, meta! if we had only known earlier that she was going to die!”
“it does not look like mamma.”
“the moment death comes, the change begins. it has begun in mamma. do you understand me, meta? in a few days i shall hear read over her by your grandpapa——” george stopped: it suddenly occurred to him that the reverend mr. hastings would not officiate this time; and he amended his sentence. “i shall hear read over her the words she has i know often read to you; how the corruptible body must die, and be buried in the earth as a grain of wheat is, ere it can be changed and put on immortality.”
“will she never come again?” sobbed meta.
“never here, never again. we shall go to her.”
meta sobbed on. “i want mamma! i want mamma, who talked to me and nursed me. mamma loved us.”
“yes, she loved us,” he said, his heart wrung with the recollection of the past: “we shall never find any one else to love us as she loved. meta, child, listen! mamma lives still; she is looking down from heaven now, and sees and hears us; she loves us, and will love us for ever. and when our turn shall come to die, i hope—i hope—we shall have learnt all that she has learnt, so that god may take us to her.”
it was of no use prolonging the scene: george still questioned his judgment in allowing meta to enter upon it. but as he rose to carry her away, the child turned her head with a sharp eager motion to take a last look. a last look at the still form, the dead face of her who yesterday only had been as they were.
margery had that instant come in, and was standing in her bonnet in the sitting-room. to describe her face of surprised consternation when she saw meta carried out of the chamber, would take time and trouble. “you can dress her, margery,” george said, giving the child into her arms.
but for his subdued tones, and the evident emotion which lay upon him all too palpably in spite of his efforts to suppress it, margery might have given her private opinion of the existing state of things. as it was, she confined her anger to dumb-show. jerking meta to her, with a half fond, half fierce gesture, she lifted her hand in dismay at sight of the naked feet, turned her own gown up, and flung it over them.
