"I dare not hope for it," returned the clergyman; "though I would give my life for him."
As he spoke he passed on, and the colonel and Helen continued their walk in sad silence. Colonel Desmond was half surprised at his little girl's silence. He even thought that she ought to have spoken, and hoped that she was not growing hard-hearted.
He did not look at her face, or its strained unchildlike expression might have alarmed him. Neither could he see her when, finding herself alone in her own room, she sat down and buried her face in her hands, moaning, "I would give my life for him, my life for him," while tearless sobs shook her slight frame.
No one thought of Helen through those sad days, no one pitied her. Even her father was vexed that through her thoughtlessness she had made it possible for people to say that she was answerable for Harold's illness. More and more the poor little head puzzled itself over questions that can find no answer here; but strangest of all it seemed to her to think of the days when Harold was the Rectory grievance, the bitterest drop in his mother's cup, and to contrast them with the present, when love was fighting its bitter battle over him with death.
How miserable Agatha had looked in church last Sunday! Perhaps even Agatha knew that she loved her brother now. How sad that love and tenderness should come too late! Was it always so?
CHAPTER VII.
"IF I HAD BUT LOVED HER."
Dearly as Mrs. Desmond loved London and the comforts of her own home, she had no desire to spend the last days of sultry July in Bloomsbury Square. The Grange being no longer, in her eyes, a safe abode, the difficult question now arose where next to go. Long and anxious were the consultations that took place between husband and wife upon this subject. At last Colonel Desmond, glancing over the Times advertisement sheet, read of a pleasure steamer which was to start for the Baltic and St. Petersburg on the 1st of August. An idea struck him. Mrs. Desmond owned some property in Russia. Would she not like to see it? The short voyage would be agreeable. They might return by Vienna and Germany. Should they go? The idea actually found favour in Mrs. Desmond's eyes. She had had no experience of travelling by sea, and fancied that a voyage would be pleasant enough. And if they returned by Germany even the colonel might be brought to see the wisdom of placing Helen at one of those excellent German schools of which Mrs. Desmond had been wont to speak scornfully enough in times gone by. She did not forget that she had done so; but the knowledge that Helen had forced her to act in a manner contrary to her openly-expressed opinions added to the bitterness of her feelings towards the girl.
Rather to the colonel's surprise his wife raised no question about Helen's accompanying them on the projected trip. Longford Grange was deserted in all haste. Mrs. Desmond declared that the place had not suited her, and that she was thankful to see the last of it. Neither was the colonel sorry. Only Helen's heart ached as she drove with her parents through the village on her way to the station, straining her eyes to catch a last glimpse of the Rectory, where Harold lay, as they had just heard, between life and death.