“Send all these people away. Quick Mary! Bring some one who can carry him to his room. And—stay, Eulalie, sit down there and be quiet. Don't let any one go and alarm Elizabeth.”
She gave these orders and everybody listened and obeyed; people are so ready to obey any guiding spirit at such a crisis. Then she bent down again over the poor corpselike figure that rested against her knee, kissed the old man's forehead, and tried to comfort him. She had heard of cases, when though deprived of speech and motion, the sufferer was still conscious of all passing around him. Therefore she wished as soon as possible to remove her father-in-law out of the way of the terrified household.
He was carried to his room through the hall where he had lately trod so stately,—the poor old man now helpless as the dead. Leaving the dining-room, Agatha thought she saw his eyes turn back, as if he knew that he was crossing the doorway he would never cross more, and wanted to take a last look at the familiar things. Otherwise he seemed continually watching herself. She walked beside him till he was laid upon his bed, and then tried again to speak to him. She did it caressingly, as though the old dying man had been a sick child.
“Be content, now—quite content. I will take care of you, and see that all is done right. I shall, not be away two minutes; I am only going to send for help—your own doctor from Kingcombe. We must try to get you well. Lie here quiet.”
Quiet! It was like enjoining stillness to a corpse! Agatha shuddered when she had used the word. For a moment the dread of her position rose upon her. In that lonely house, at night too, with no help nearer than Kingcombe: and even then no husband, no friend—for she dared not send to poor, sick Anne Valery! And she so young, so inexperienced.—But no matter! She would try to meet everything—do everything. She felt already calm and brave.
The first thing necessary was to send for medical aid. This she did; having the forethought to write a few clear lines, lest the messenger should fail. She despatched word likewise to the Dugdales. She felt quite composed; everything right to be remembered came clearly into her head. It was the grand touch-stone of her character; the crisis of danger which shows whether a woman has that presence of mind which exalts her into a domestic heroine, an angel of comfort; or the weakness which sinks her into a helpless selfish fool.
The latter was hardly likely to become a true picture of Agatha Harper.
She went about with Mary, giving some orders to the servants, for sickness always comes startingly upon an unprepared and unaccustomed house; and tried to find a few soothing words for the terrified Eulalie, who clung crying about them both, forgetting all her affectations. If the Beauty had any love left in her, it was for her father. Lastly, Agatha took a light, and went swiftly along the passages to the distant wing of the house which Elizabeth occupied.
“Miss Harper,” her maid said, “had gone quietly to rest, and was then fast sleeping.”
Poor Elizabeth! this seemed the hardest point of all.