“What is it; what is it? The water? Has she come to herself?”
“You must let me take her in,” said Arthur, in a low, quiet voice, while James held back his mother; and Wood said, choking: “Lord have mercy on us, ma’am; she’ll never come to herself in this world!” Arthur took no notice; he went on, and they all followed indiscriminately, the servants rushing out with wild cries and questions. Arthur went up the steps, across the terrace, and through the open window, into the drawing-room, where, on the sofa, he laid his dead love down. Then he paused, hanging over her, and drew the handkerchief a little back, and put his hand softly on her wrist.
“Arthur! Arthur, my poor boy, come away,” said James, in his ear.
Arthur turned round and faced them.
“How did it happen? how did it happen?” gasped Mrs Crichton.
“The noise of the gun startled her, and she fell off the lock. She struck her head against the side, and she is dead—she is dead,” he repeated. And, in the moment’s blank pause that followed, Alice Wood’s voice rose in a wild shriek: “Dead! oh, Miss Mysie’s dead!”
“Take care of that poor little girl,” said Arthur; “she has—” but with the words his voice failed him; he staggered, and fell down in a dead faint, before James could catch him, for they had all fallen back with a sort of awe, before his collected voice and the wild stare in his eyes.
They lifted Arthur up and carried him into the house and upstairs to his own room, whither the doctor followed them. The maid-servants pressed into the drawing-room, with tears and cries of pity, till the old nurse came and put them all back. She knew what to do.
Mrs Crichton sat down again in her chair on the terrace, Frederica crouching with her head in her aunt’s lap, while Wood, whose daughter had been carried off by the maids, repeated the sad story.
It was not very easy to understand its details, told with sobs and comments innumerable; but the fact was slowly borne in on them—Mysie was dead!