"Great Heavens!" she cried, "what has my father done to you?"
Rachael had exhausted herself. She lay down, panting for breath; her lips were apart; the edges of her teeth were visible; she did not answer.
Clara forgot her own cause of offence, and laid her hand over those wide-open, burning eyes.
"Poor mamma Rachael! now try and sleep. I never saw you so nervous before. Did you know it? you were walking in your sleep."
The cool touch of that hand soothed the woman. Clara felt the eyelids close under her palm; but a heavy pulse was beating in the temples, which resisted all her gentle mesmerism for a long time; but, after a while, the worn frame seemed to rest, and Clara sank down in weary sleepiness by her side.
When she awoke again Lady Hope was gone. It was the dark hour of the morning; the moon had disappeared from the heavens; the shadows, in diffusing themselves, spread out into general darkness.
"Ah, I have had a weary dream," she murmured; "I have heard of such things, but never had anything dark upon my sleep before. How real it was! My father home, Hepworth gone, my mother in this bed, trembling, moaning, and, worst of all, against me and him. Ah, it was a terrible dream!"
She turned upon her pillow, full of sleepy thankfulness, and the next instant had deluded herself into a tranquil sleep.
A rapid fall of hoofs upon the avenue shook the stillness. Nearer and nearer they came; then a clang of the great bronze knocker at the principal entrance awoke her thoroughly.
The girl listened; her dream was fast taking shape, and she knew that it was a reality. Had this untimely arrival anything to do with it? A knock at her chamber-door, and her father's voice answered the question.