But soon they could no longer hope; soon hope was gone. For all their dignity, for all their learning, they could only give her drugs to make it easier to die; they could only prop her up against the pillows in the great Tudor bed, and smooth the dark coverlet, and tiptoe from the room, leaving her to her duke. She sat there still and small, her hands on his black head where he knelt beside her, with so little breath left to tell him of her love that she sought the shortest words, she who had been a spendthrift of them.
“Darlin’.” He did not stir, even at that. “Never grieve. I’ve known it a great while; they told me in London before you came that ’twould be no more than a year. And my Aunt Dasheen, she was wise before they. ‘Wed at seventeen, dead at eighteen’——”
“Biddy,” he whispered, “I’ve killed you—I’ve killed you.”
“Oh, what talk is this? You, who gave me my life? I never minded the dying—’twas only when I thought how lonely it would be, with no one caring whether I came or went. I’ve forgotten what loneliness is with you by me. Look up at me.”
He raised his head—and her eyes were dancing.
“Has it yellow hair?”
“Yes.”
“Will you teach it to laugh?”
“Biddy—Biddy——”
“’Twill be dull in Heaven without you,” she said. “But ’twill be gay when you come.” She leaned toward him, her lips curved to mischief. “Wait till they tell my Aunt Dasheen—Saint Peter himself will have to laugh. ‘Woman, there’s someone just come asking after you—a little one, even on her toes. She says her name is Biddy and she’s Duchess of Bolingham——’”