Finding there was no mistake, Marion sprung out of bed, threw on her dressing-gown, rushed up stairs, and having hastily thrown open the door, she stood there transfixed for a moment with amazement and fear. Through the glimmering dawn of light, she saw that Sir Arthur was up, and completely dressed, while he appeared to be hurriedly groping about the room, as if packing up for a journey. He seemed unconscious of Marion's entrance, who stood for several minutes watching him in speechless perplexity and consternation, while her very blood forgot to flow, when she saw the stony look of his eyes. His countenance was of an ashy paleness, his long grey hair matted over his forehead, his expression sad beyond mortality, and when she took his hand in her own, it felt cold and damp. His eyes wandered over her face for a moment, without any apparent recognition, and then giving a smile of utter vacancy, he resumed his occupation with restless eagerness.
"Uncle Arthur! dear uncle Arthur! what are you doing?" exclaimed Marion, throwing her arms round him, while her limbs were faint, and trembled with fear. "Speak, dear uncle! Speak to your own Marion! Why do you not speak?"
A deep silence ensued. Sir Arthur evidently did not hear her. His cold, livid lips moved as if he would have spoken, but not a sound became audible, and with the same vacant smile as before, he turned away. The terror-stricken Marion now felt utterly appalled. A death-like sickness came over her, horror and darkness seemed gathering over her mind, and apprehensive lest her senses might entirely fail, she hastily and vehemently rang the bell, calling loudly for assistance.
Marion's was an intellect of that high tone which rises to meet a great emergency, and though nearly paralyzed by grief and terror, when she first saw the fearful, ghastly smile, with which her uncle gazed around him, she now endeavored, by gentle persuasion, to make him lie down in his bed, and tried, by speaking in accents of tenderness, to recall his recollection, while impatiently longing for Martin to appear; and during the few minutes that elapsed till he entered, it seemed as if time itself had ceased to move.
The doctor was at length summoned, and having pronounced the Admiral's illness to be caused by an oppression of the brain, threatening apoplexy, he attempted to bleed his patient, though almost without success; for Marion observed, while she held him in her arms, that the blood scarcely flowed, till after some time he uttered a fearful, convulsive cry, which rang through the room, and fell back in a violent spasm, the immediate precursor of apoplexy.
Awe-struck and paralyzed with grief, Marion clung to her uncle, and remained by his side, watching with deep and solemn affection every turn of his features; while her cheek assumed the hue of death, her tearless eyes were motionless, her quivering lips compressed, and she remained as silent and immoveable as if the mortal shaft had reached herself. Without shedding a tear or breathing a sigh, she bent over the distorted countenance of Sir Arthur, and assisted in cutting off the long white locks of his hair, which she had often loved to look upon, but which were now strewed all unheeded on the bed, and again seating herself by his side, she riveted his hand in her own, becoming white and motionless as an image of marble.
Notice had been sent to Agnes' room of the afflicting event which had taken place, and Marion expected every instant that her sister would appear; but time passed on, and she came not, being one who systematically avoided any scenes of distress, therefore she satisfied herself with sending frequent messages of inquiry to the door. At length, after some hours, Sir Arthur appeared to have recovered his recollection; for he looked at Marion with a feeble smile of deep affection, and laid his hand on her head as if to bless her; but words were denied him; he struggled in vain to speak; and she who had not yet found the solace of a tear, now bursting into an irresistible agony of weeping, sobbed aloud. After gazing long and tenderly in her face, Sir Arthur's eye-lids at length closed with fatigue, and still clasping her hand in his, he fell into a peaceful, quiet slumber of many hours' duration.
Those who have most leisure to contemplate death, generally think least about it, and no one had ever meditated less on the subject than Agnes. She occasionally remarked, when the infirmities of the old and the indigent were forced upon her notice, that they might hope soon to be released, and that to them it must, of course, be a happy escape. The busy and active, she thought, had scarcely time to die; and, for herself, she considered death as a very unpleasant subject, which fifty years hence must be attended to, when the joys and the dreams of her present life had vanished; but it seemed to her most preposterous now, to lower her spirits by melancholy reflections on what could not certainly be avoided, and would come only too soon in the end. In short, her whole plan of life was, "To-day to sparkle, and to-morrow die."
Marion had stolen away to complete her midnight toilette, before she settled for the day beside Sir Arthur's pillow, when she was amazed near the door to meet Agnes, hurrying past in travelling costume, and anxious, apparently, to avoid being seen, though, when an interview became inevitable, she tried to carry it off with careless audacity, being evidently in a perfect delirium of high spirits, which she vainly tried to conceal.
"Well, Marion! I am quite relieved to hear from Martin that there is not the slightest danger! The doctors also say that everything has taken a favorable turn, though, as for their opinion, I have despised all physicians from Esculapius down to the magnesia-and-rhubarb doctors of the present day. They all tell us the same thing of an invalid, 'If he does not die, he will certainly recover!'"