“Milisent Louvaine,” saith Aunt Joyce, “if thou be alive twenty years hence, thou shalt thank God from thy very heart-root that thou wert stayed on that road to-day.”
“Oh ay, that is what folk always say!” murmurs she, and laid her down again. “‘Thou wilt thank me twenty years hence,’ quoth they, every stinging stroke of the birch. And they look for us beaten hounds to crede it, forsooth!”
“Ay—when the twenty years be over.”
“I am little like to thank you at twenty years’ end,” saith Milly sullenly, “for I count I shall die of heart-break afore twenty weeks.”
“No, Milly, I think not.”
“And much you care!”
Then I saw Aunt Joyce’s face alter—terribly.
“Milisent,” she said, “if I had not cared, I should scantly have gone of set purpose through that which wrung every fibre of my heart, ay, to the heart’s core.”
“It wrung me more than you,” Milisent makes answer, of the same bitter, angered tone as aforetime.
Aunt Joyce turned away from the bed, and I saw pain and choler strive for a moment in her eyes. Then the choler fell back, and the pain abode.