Thus encouraged, Drusilla began to speak of the state of her own health, of her youthful inexperience, and of her forlorn circumstances.
In doing this she tried to cover the sin of her guilty husband, by explaining his absence in the stereotyped manner that he himself had often used, and putting it upon the ground of “business connected with his late father’s will.”
But this effort was too much for her superficial composure. The very name of Mr. Lyon overthrew her self-control. In speaking of him her voice faltered, then she choked, gasped and broke into a violent fit of sobs and tears that shook her fragile frame almost to the point of dissolution.
The nurse was much too wise to coax or scold her patient. But the sly old fox, who had blown her daughter up for meddling with dangerous drugs, went herself and mixed a composing draught for the sufferer—and not of the harmless valerian that had been administered by Pina, but of potent morphine that in a few moments sent Drusilla into a sleep that lasted all that afternoon and night.
But, ah! when she did at length awake, on this the third morning after the great blow had fallen on her, she awoke but to the renewal of anguish intolerable; of sorrow that refused to be comforted; of despair that had forgotten the very existence of hope.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
HOPING AGAINST HOPE.
’Tis hard, so young—so young as I am still,
To feel forevermore from life depart
All that can flatter the poor human will,
Or fill the heart.