She stopped when she saw it. Almost it appeared to her as if she could not go farther to meet the realization of her dread. Everything looked so still—no little white fairy at the garden gate watching for mamma, not a sound among the trees. How could she go on into the desolate solitude? But, after a moment's pause, her strength returned. If the blow had indeed fallen no delay could avert it. On then, up to the little gate, through the garden, with still the same chilling silence. No little face at the window, no sound of merry laughter, no light bounding steps. The hall door was open; she passed in. With haggard face she peered into the rooms, hoping against hope for a sight of that tiny figure.
The child would be asleep perhaps, wearied out by the pleasant fatigue of the bright day: she would be found behind sofa or ottoman or curtains, curled up like a kitten, or tired out with watching for mamma, she had thrown herself down on her little bed. Like one who seeks thirstily for hid treasure, Margaret looked, her soul in her eyes, into every nook and corner of her little domain: corners possible and impossible she searched, for the mother's heart within was crying out, and she could not despair until nothing else would be possible. She was so absorbed in her hopeless task that she did not know she was being watched, that a pair of lynx eyes, in which cool triumph was shining, noted her every movement; that when at last, worn out and despairing, she crept, like one who has received a death-wound, into her sitting-room and threw herself down, almost lost to the knowledge of what she was doing, upon hands and knees to the ground in her exceeding agony, her servant was glorying in her fall, triumphing at her expense; but so it was. Jane Rodgers's hour had come. Her lodger was paying, and paying dearly, for her insolence.
She did not wish to be discovered, and she had seen enough to assure herself that the blow had told. Retreating softly from the hall, with a smile on her lips that was not a pleasant one to look upon, she returned to her comfortable kitchen, leaving her mistress alone in her agony.
Jane Rodgers had one anxiety. She muttered its import to herself as she stooped over the fire to turn a piece of bacon which was frizzing merrily for her tea. "Trouble do sometimes kill people; it wouldn't do to have a death in the house, and she looked queer; but there! she'll get over it, and perhaps be a trifle civiller for the future."
So even this anxiety, as it appeared, did not affect Jane very severely. She lifted the frying-pan carefully from the fire, placed its contents in a plate that had been warming in the oven, and sat down to enjoy her tea in peace.
To Margaret it seemed as if all the glory had gone from earth. True, her desolation had been grievous at times, but she had ever possessed some consolation; now in a moment all seemed rent from her. Hope, for if he had ever wished to see her again in this world he would not have taken away her little one; love, for the clinging affection which had become so precious would nevermore surround her—Laura would be taught to forget, perhaps even to despise, her mother; peace, for if her husband was so terribly changed, how would he bring up their daughter? and, doing his very best, could he surround her with the watchful care of a woman—a mother?—Laura, as her mother had learned, was so sensitive and tender; joy, for she was alone, uncared for, a widowed wife, a childless mother.
One after another came these cruel thoughts to crush her as she crouched down upon the ground, plucking with nervous, aimless fingers at the sofa-trimmings. For the last stroke had told. The poor heart was incapable of bearing more. Margaret's mind was in danger. She was standing, though she knew it not, on the border-land which skirts the dark region of insanity. A little more of this heart-dissecting torture and that numbing, more to be dreaded than the keenest pain, would of necessity be the result, and the beautiful, fair-souled woman be changed, by the mysterious action of disease, into a maniac, a pitiable object in the sight of God and men. Was this last, this bitterest woe reserved for her?
No: suddenly the consciousness of the new danger dawned upon her. She caught the wild, wandering thoughts and sternly brought them to bay; then, shuddering, she threw herself on her knees.
"My God," she cried piteously, "send me death in thy mercy—death before madness—for I can bear no more, no more."