"I saw you, child, but had no heart to make you more sorrowful."
"Did you think him so fearfully dangerous, then?" questioned the lady, with terror in her blue eyes. "I tried to persuade myself that it was only my fears. Every morning I came out and gathered such quantities of flowers for his room, but he never once noticed them, or me—"
"You! Have you seen him, then?"
A flood of crimson swept that fair face, and the white lids drooped over the eyes that sunk beneath his.
"No—no one else could arrange the flowers as he liked them. Once or twice—but only when his eyes were closed. I never once disturbed him."
"Dear child, how he ought to love you!"
Sir Noel kissed the crimson forehead, which drooped down to the girl's uplifted hands, and he knew that the flush, which had first been one of maiden shame, was deepened by coming tears.
"There, there, my child, we must not grieve when the doctors give us hope for the first time. He is sleeping, they tell me, a calm, natural sleep. Go, and arrange these flowers after your own dainty fashion. He will notice them when he awakes. Already he has called the doctor by name."
"Oh, uncle! dear, dear guardian, is it so?"
The girl fell upon her knees by a great easy-chair that stood by, and the blossoms, no longer supported by her hand, fell in glowing masses around her as she gave way to such happy sobs as had never shaken her frame before. At last she looked up, smiling through her tears.