And she went on in the slow and painful way which had become habitual to her.
"I have been tortured in my heart, thinking of his coming out upon the weary world, all alone, broken down may be, with none to take him by the hand, and me lying here upon my back, unable to help him. Oh, it is hard! And sometimes in a dream I see his mother, Lucy, my own little sister that died so many years ago, floating over the walls of his prison, and signing to me to fetch him out. But now she will rest in her grave, and I myself could die to-night and be happy, because you will not forsake him. My dear, he loves you like his own soul!"
Lettice did not reply, but she kissed the cheek of Alan's aunt, and bade her try to sleep.
It was growing dark. Through the window she could trace the outlines of the garden below. She was tempted by the balmy night, and went out.
"He loves you like his own soul!" Was not that how she loved him, and was she not here in England to tell him so?
The question startled her, as though some one else had put it to her, and was waiting for an answer. That, surely, was not her object; and yet, if not, what was? From the hour when she read Sydney's letter at Florence she seemed to have had a new motive power within her. She had acted hitherto from instinct, or from mere feeling; she could scarcely recall a single argument which she had held with herself during the past ten days. She might have been walking in a dream, so little did she seem to have used her reason or her will. Yet much had happened since she left Italy.
On Thursday she had arrived in London with Mrs. Hartley.
On Saturday she went out by herself, and managed to see the governor of the gaol where Alan was lodged. From him she learned, to her dismay, that "Number 79" had had a severe and almost fatal illness. He was still very weak, though out of danger, and it was thought that with the careful attention which he was receiving in the infirmary he would probably be able to leave on the 29th of October.
Captain Haynes told her that his prisoner appeared to have no relatives "except the wife, who was not likely to give herself much trouble about him, and an aunt in the country who was paralyzed." So, Lettice arranged to bring a carriage to the prison gates on the morning of the 29th, and to fetch him away.
Having learned Mrs. Bundlecombe's address, thanks to the letter which had been written to the governor by Mrs. Chigwin, she came to Birchmead on Monday—lingering an hour or two at Angleford in order that she might see her native place again, and recall the image of the father whom she had loved and lost.