‘Let me go and see what is the matter with little Dick first,’ I said, taking up the lighted candle.
Bessie yelled at being kept alone in the dark, but I could not have lain down again without ascertaining what ailed the little fellow; so, disregarding her remonstrances, I walked off to Mrs Graham’s room. Her door was unlocked, and I entered without knocking.
The child was still crying lustily; and what was my surprise to find his nurse, utterly regardless of the noise, sitting up in bed, with scared wide-open eyes, talking vehemently.
‘Go away!’ she was exclaiming in a loud voice; ‘Go away! and don’t come back again. You let the water in each time you open the door: I tell you we don’t want you! Go away, I say, and don’t come back again!’
She halted for a moment at this juncture, and I was about to waken her from what I perceived was a nightmare, when she suddenly clapped her hands before her eyes and screamed.
‘Ah, Heavens! a wave—a fearful wave that covers the deck—that covers everything. Where is he? Where is he gone to? I have sent him to his death! Edward! Edward! come back to me! I didn’t mean it—I didn’t mean it! Ah! Lord have pity on me.’
Her agitation was rising so rapidly, and the baby was crying so violently, that I thought it time to interfere.
‘Mrs Graham!’ I exclaimed, shaking her by the arm, ‘wake up. Don’t you hear the baby wants you?’
She turned her big eyes upon me in such a pitiful vacuous way. Then she recognised me, and looked frightened.