"'Tis he, I feel assured," said Martin. "I cannot mistake that form, even so indistinctly seen, for there is none other like him. Alas! alas! 'tis even so. He watches her window even in such a night as this. I saw they loved each other from the first. Well, we are in the hands of heaven, and 'tis wrong to murmur. If our ills are reparable, to complain is ungrateful; if irremediable, 'tis vain. Whatever happens must have first pleased God, and most pleased him; or it had not happened. There is no affliction which resignation cannot conquer or death cure."
As Martin resigned himself to this comfortable doctrine he turned and re-entered the house.
The dawn was now beginning to break, and he resolved to knock at the chamber door of the invalid and make some inquiry after her.
The first grey tint of morning began to render objects in the room visible as he passed through it. There stood the spinnet upon which Charlotte had so lately played, the music-book open. There was her lute lying beside the music, and where it had been laid on the night of the party, and beside that lay the hood and jesses of her favourite hawk.
Whilst Martin regarded these remembrances of one now unable to use or enjoy them, a pang of grief shot through his heart, that sorrowful feeling with which we look upon the relics of the dead, and whom we have loved dearly when in life; and with that feeling came the conviction that she who once played so sweetly on that instrument, and so bravely wore those trappings of her gallant bird,—she, the young, the beautiful, was already parted perhaps for ever from the pleasures of the earth,—sick, prostrate, dying,—nay, even at that moment perhaps dead.
With heavy heart and evil foreboding he ascended the great staircase and sought Charlotte's room. His step was heard by the nurse who attended on the invalid, and gently opening the door she came forth to meet him.
The nurse was one of the old servants of the family; she was pale as death Martin observed as he advanced along the corridor. "We have had a fearful night," she said.
"But your charge?" said Martin, "I trust in Heaven she is better."
"Worse, Martin, worse," she replied; "worse than I can bring myself to tell thee. She is now asleep, but hath been delirious all the night."
"Now the gods help us," said Martin.