He was not a little surprised one morning on receiving Mrs. Woodward's invitation to Hampton. Mrs. Woodward in writing had had some difficulty in wording her request. She hardly liked asking Charley to come because Katie was ill; nor did she like to ask him without mentioning Katie's illness. 'I need not explain to you,' she said in her note, 'that we are all in great distress; poor Katie is very ill, and you will understand what we must feel about Alaric and Gertrude. Harry is still at Normansgrove. We shall all be glad to see you, and Katie, who never forgets what you did for her, insists on my asking you at once. I am sure you will not refuse her, so I shall expect you to-morrow.' Charley would not have refused her anything, and it need hardly be said that he accepted the invitation.
Mrs. Woodward was at a loss how to receive him, or what to say to him. Though Katie was so positive that her own illness would be fatal—a symptom which might have confirmed those who watched her in their opinion that her disease was not consumption—her mother was by no means so desponding. She still thought it not impossible that her child might recover, and so thinking could not but be adverse to any declaration on Katie's part of her own feelings. She had endeavoured to explain this to her daughter; but Katie was so carried away by her enthusiasm, was at the present moment so devoted, and, as it were, exalted above her present life, that all that her mother said was thrown away upon her. Mrs. Woodward might have refused her daughter's request, and have run the risk of breaking her heart by the refusal; but now that the petition had been granted, it was useless to endeavour to teach her to repress her feelings.
'Charley,' said Mrs. Woodward, when he had been some little time in the house, 'our dear Katie wants to see you; she is very ill, you know.'
Charley said he knew she was ill.
'You remember our walk together, Charley.'
'Yes,' said Charley, 'I remember it well. I made you a promise then, and I have kept it. I have now come here only because you have sent for me.' This he said in the tone which a man uses when he feels himself to have been injured.
'I know it, Charley; you have kept your promise; I knew you would, and I know you will. I have the fullest trust in you; and now you shall come and see her.'
Charley was to return to town that night, and they had not therefore much time to lose; they went upstairs at once, and found Linda and Uncle Bat in the patient's room. It was a lovely August evening, and the bedroom window opening upon the river was unclosed. Katie, as she sat propped up against the pillows, could look out upon the water and see the reedy island, on which in happy former days she had so delighted to let her imagination revel.
'It is very good of you to come and see me, Charley,' said she, as he made his way up to her bedside.
He took her wasted hand in his own and pressed it, and, as he did so, a tear forced itself into each corner of his eyes. She smiled as though to cheer him, and said that now she saw him she could be quite happy, only for poor Alaric and Gertrude. She hoped she might live to see Alaric again; but if not, Charley was to give him her best-best love.