It is easy to smile at the folly of an ambitious girl's wild imaginings; but is there not something pathetic too in such ignorant, blind forecasting of the future? Poor childish Juliet, giddy and elated, was treading the very verge of a precipice without the least notion of the chasm which yawned below. And those who might have saved her from it were unconscious of her peril, and, all unwittingly, were urging her nearer and nearer to the fatal brink.
[CHAPTER XI]
HIS LAST MESSAGE
IT was a cold, gloomy day towards the end of the year. Juliet, in the worst of her many possible humours, was lounging in an easy-chair by the fire, a yellow-backed novel in her hand. Her eyes looked dull and heavy; there was a flush on her cheeks that was not caused by the heat of the fire, and when she spoke her voice was very hoarse. She was suffering from a severe cold on her chest, which, much to her annoyance, had prevented her from taking her singing lesson as usual on the previous day.
Her mother, who sat with her knitting at the opposite side of the fireplace, glanced at her from time to time with an air of concern. She would have been much better in bed; but Juliet had absolutely refused to remain there.
"I do wish you would not look at me so, mother, every time I cough!" exclaimed Juliet, impatiently. "You need not think I am going to die just because I cough a little."
"My dear child, how you talk!" said Mrs. Tracy. "I only long to relieve your cough. Would you drink a little black currant tea if I made you some?"
"Oh, mother, don't worry me; you know how I hate all those decoctions. If only you would leave me alone."
And Juliet lay back wearily in her chair and took up her book again. It did not interest her particularly. Nothing interested her to-day. She was causing her mother a great deal of trouble; but she was far more troublesome to herself, and that not because her head ached, her chest was sore, and she felt ill all over. There was an inner discomfort that was far worse than her physical ailments. In her inaction, thoughts pressed upon her from which she would gladly have escaped. Her novel, exciting though the plot was, could not drive them away. Her own life-story was more absorbing to her at this time than any romance that human imagination could conceive. She found herself forced to review certain of her past actions, and to ponder their probable consequences.
Conscience had somewhat to say concerning these, and its remonstrances irritated her, though she would not own them to be well-founded. Then would come thoughts that were at once sweet and fear-inspiring' and visions of the future which sent the blood coursing more rapidly through her veins, and heightened the fever with which her whole frame was throbbing.