"The Protector will not live long, I think. I heard him tell her they would not be parted a space worth counting."
"He would say that much for her comfort. He meant it not in respect of his own days; no life is a space worth counting—'of few days and full of trouble, Alice.' How is her Highness, Elizabeth Cromwell?"
"Very quiet and resigned. Blow upon blow has benumbed her. She looks as if she had seen something not to be spoken of. Lady Mary Fanconberg says the family ought to leave Hampton Court; there is a feeling about the place both unhappy and unnatural. I felt it. Every one felt it, even the soldiers on guard."
After the death of his beloved daughter Elizabeth, the life of Cromwell was like the ending of one of those terrible Norse Sagas with the additional element of a great spiritual conflict. He was aware of his own apparition at his side; the air was full of omens; he felt the menace of some shadowy adversary in the dark; he saw visions; he dreamed beyond nature; he had, at times, the wild spirits of a fey man, and again was almost beside himself with unspeakable grief. Israel Swaffham was constantly with him. The two men were friends closer than brothers. They had loved each other when boys, and their love had never known a shadow.
"But I am in great trouble about him," said Israel to his wife. "It cannot last. Since Lady Claypole's death he eats not, drinks not, sleeps not; his strong, masculine handwriting, the very mirror of his courageous spirit, has become weak and trembling. He lives much alone, keeps from his family as if he feared they might be in danger from his danger. And he thinks and thinks, hour after hour; and 'tis thinking that is killing him. I can tell you one thing, Martha, a thinking soul is always sorrowful enough, but when it is a great soul like Oliver's, and it is wretched for any cause, then every thought draws blood."
"For such dismal thought and feeling there is the Holy Scriptures."
"Yes, yes, Oliver knows the Comforter, and sometimes there is a message for him. Last night he made Harvey read him the fourth of Philippians, and he said when he had listened to it, 'This Scripture did once save my life when my eldest son died, which went as a dagger to my heart, indeed it did;' then, with a great joy he repeated the words, 'I can do all things through Christ which strengthened! me;' adding, 'He that was Paul's Christ, is my Christ too!'"
Cromwell had hoped that his great afflictions would bring his friends back to his side; but envy, hatred and greedy ambition are not to be conciliated. Even at this time, Ludlow, Lambert, Vane, Harrison, Marten,—all the men whom he had trusted, and who had trusted him, stood aloof from his sorrow; and their sullen indifference wounded him to the quick. He had a burning fever both of the body and soul, but in two weeks he gathered a little strength and left Hampton Court for Whitehall. His unfinished work drove at him like a taskmaster. He must make great haste, for he knew that the night was coming.
"I am glad he is back in Whitehall," said Martha to her husband, when she heard of the change. "I remember something that Jane said about that old, gloomy Court; he will get better in London."
"I know not, Martha," answered Israel sadly; "Fairfax was with him to-day, and he might as well have drawn his sword on his old friend,—better and kinder had he done so."