"Softly," she said; "they sleep; don't disturb them." Edward looked closely into the face of the old man, and then to the surprise of the girl placed his arm about her waist.
"Do not cry out," he said; "keep calm and remember that the little mamma's health—"
"What do you mean?" she said, looking with wonder into his agitated face as she sought gently to free herself. "Have you forgotten——"
"This is sleep indeed—but the sleep of eternity."
She sprang from him with sudden terror and laid her hand upon the cold forehead of her father. For an instant she stared into his face, with straining eyes, and then with one frightful scream she sank by his side, uttering his name in agonized tones.
Edward strove tearfully to calm her; it was too late. Calling upon husband and daughter frantically, Mrs. Montjoy rushed from her room into the presence of death. She was blindfolded, but with unerring instinct she found the still form and touched the dead face. The touch revealed the truth; with one quick motion she tore away the bandages from her face, and then in sudden awe the words fell from her:
"I am blind!" Mary had risen to her side and was clinging to her, and Edward had assisted, fearing she might fall to the floor. But with the consciousness of her last misfortune had soon come calmness. She heeded not the cries of the girl appealing to her, but knelt with her white face lifted and said simply:
"Dear Father, Thou art merciful; I have not seen him dead! Blest forever be Thy Holy name!" Edward turned his back and stood with bowed head, the silence broken now only by the sobs of the daughter. Still sleeping in the lap of the dead, her chubby hand clasping the wonderful toy, was the Duchess, and at her feet the streaming sunlight. The little boy came to the door riding the old man's gold-headed cane for a horse and carrying the cow horn, which he had pushed from its nail upon the porch.
"Grandpa, ain't it time to blow the horn?" he said. "Grandma, why don't grandpa wake up?" She drew him to her breast and silenced his queries.
And still with a half-smile upon his patrician face—the face that women and children loved and all men honored—sat the colonel; one more leaf from the old south blown to earth.