Mrs. Gray remained mute. She looked back in the past for the image of her lost child. She saw a pale face, with blue eyes and fair hair, like Mary's. Never before had the resemblance struck her; when it came, it acted with overpowering force on a nature which, though rugged, and stern, and embittered by age and sorrows, was neither cold nor forgetful.
One solitary love, but ardent and impassioned, had Sarah Gray known, in her life of three-score and ten—the love of a harsh, but devoted mother for an only child. For that child's sake had its father, whom she had married more for prudential reasons than for motives of affection, become dear to her heart. He was the father of her Jane. For that child's sake, had she, without repining, borne the burden of Rachel. Rachel was the sister of her Jane. Never should Rachel want, whilst she had heart and hands to work, and earn her a bit of bread.
But when this much-loved child, after ripening to early youth, withered and dropped from the tree of life; when she was laid to sleep in a premature grave, all trace of the holy and beautiful tenderness which gives its grace to womanhood, seemed to pass away from the bereaved mother's heart. She became more harsh, more morose than she had ever been, and had it been worth the world's while to note or record it, of her too it might have been said, as it was of England's childless King, "that from one sad day she smiled no more." And now, when she heard Rachel, when in her mind she compared the living with the dead, strength, pride, fortitude forsook her, her stern features worked, her aged bosom heaved, passionate tears flowed down her wrinkled cheek.
"Oh! my darling—my lost darling!" she cried, in broken accents, "would I could have died for thee! would thou wert here to-day! would my old bones filled thy young grave!"
And she threw her apron over her face, and moaned with bitterness and anguish.
"Mother, dear mother, do not, pray do not!" cried Rachel, distressed and alarmed at so unusual a burst of emotion. After a while, Mrs. Gray unveiled her face. It was pale and agitated; but her tears had ceased. For years they had not flowed, and until her dying day, they flowed no more.
"Rachel," she said, looking in her step-daughter's face, "I forgive you. You have nearly broken my heart. Let Mary come, stay, and go; but talk to me no more of the dead. Rachel, when my darling died," here her pale lips quivered, "know that I rebelled against the Lord—know that I did not give her up willingly, but only after such agony of mind and heart as a mother goes through when she sees the child she has borne, reared, cherished, fondled, lying a pale, cold bit of earth before her! And, therefore, I say, talk no more to me about the dead, lest my rebellious heart should rise again, and cry out to its Maker: 'Oh God! oh God! why didst thou take her from me!'"
Mrs. Gray rose to leave the room. On the threshold, she turned back to say in a low, sad voice:
"The child may come to-morrow, Rachel."