It was the first party of any consequence to which Mrs Revel had been invited. She considered it as her re-entrée into the fashionable world, and the presentation of her daughter; she would not have missed it for any consideration. That morning she had felt more pain than usual, and had been obliged to have recourse to restoratives; but once more to join the gay and fashionable throng—the very idea braced her nerves, rendered her callous to suffering, and indifferent to disease.
"I think," said Mrs Revel to her maid—"I think," said she, panting, "you may lace me a little closer, Martyn."
"Indeed, madam, the holes nearly meet; it will hurt your side."
"No, no, I feel no pain this evening—there, that will do."
The lady's-maid finished her task, and left the room.
Mrs Revel rouged her wan cheeks, and, exhausted with fatigue and pain, tottered to an easy-chair, that she might recover herself a little before she went downstairs.
In a quarter of an hour Isabel, who had waited for the services of Martyn, entered her mother's room, to announce that she was ready. Her mother, who was sitting in the chair, leaning backwards, answered her not. Isabel went up to her, and looked her in the face—she was dead!
Chapter LII
"My dearest wife was like this maid,
And such my daughter might have been."