“I can't see well, my dear; there's something between me and the light, and a weight is on me—here—here—”
A heavy sigh, and a shudder that shook his whole frame, followed these words.
“They told me I wasn't to see you once again,” said he, as a sickly smile played over his mouth; “but I knew you'd come to sit by me. It 's a lonely thing not to have one's own at such an hour as this. Don't weep, my dear, my own heart's failing me fast.”
A broken, muttering sound followed, and then he said, in a loud voice; “I never did it! it was Tony Basset. He told me,—he persuaded me. Ah! that was a sore day when I listened to him. Who 's to tell me I 'm not to be master of my own estate? Turn them adrift,—ay, every man of them. I 'll weed the ground of such wretches,—eh, Tony? Did any one say Freney's mother was dead? they may wake her at the cross roads, if they like. Poor old Molly! I 'm sorry for her, too. She nursed me and my sister that's gone; and maybe her deathbed, poor as she was, was easier than mine will be,—without kith or kin, child or friend. Oh, George!—and I that doted on you with all my heart! Whose hand's this? Ah, I forgot; my darling boy, it's you. Come to me here, my child! Was n't it for you that I toiled and scraped this many a year? Wasn't it for you that I did all this? and—God, forgive me!—maybe it 's my soul that I 've perilled to leave you a rich man. Where 's Tom? where 's that fellow now?”
“Here, sir!” said I, squeezing his hand, and pressing it to my lips.
He sprang up at the words, and sat up in his bed, his eyes dilated to their widest, and his pale lips parted asunder.
“Where?” cried he, as he felt me over with his thin fingers, and drew me towards him.
“Here, father, here!”
“And is this Tom?” said he, as his voice fell into a low, hollow sound; and then added: “Where's George? answer me at once. Oh, I see it! He isn't here; he would n't come over to see his old father. Tony! Tony Basset, I say!” shouted the sick man, in a voice that roused the sleepers, and brought them to his bedside, “open that window there. Let me look out,—do it as I bid you,—open it wide. Turn in all the cattle you can find on the road. Do you hear me, Tony? Drive them in from every side. Finnerty, I say, mind my words; for” (here he uttered a most awful and terrific oath), “as I linger on this side of the grave, I 'll not leave him a blade of grass I can take from him.”
His chest heaved with a convulsive spasm; his face became pale as death; his eyes fixed; he clutched eagerly at the bedclothes; and then, with a horrible cry, he fell back upon the pillow, as a faint stream of red blood trickled from his nostril and ran down his chin.