'I do not hope, Mary. No, child, I feel and know that time will never come. My strength is ebbing slowly day by day. If I live for another year, live to see Lesbia married, and you, too, perhaps—well, I shall die at peace. At peace, no; not----' she faltered, and the thin, semi-transparent hand was pressed upon her brow. 'What will be said of me when I am dead?'
Mary feared that her grandmother's mind was wandering. She came and knelt beside the couch, laid and her head against the satin pillows, tenderly, caressingly.
'Dear grandmother, pray be calm,' she murmured.
'Mary, do not look at me like that, as if you would read my heart. There are hearts that must not be looked into. Mine is like a charnel-house. Monotonous, yes; my life has been monotonous. No conventual gloom was ever deeper than the gloom of Fellside. My boy did nothing to lighten it for me, and his son followed in his father's footsteps. You and Lesbia have been my only consolation. Lesbia! I was so proud of her beauty, so proud and fond of her, because she was like me, and recalled my own youth. And see how easily she forgets me. She has gone into a new world, in which my age and my infirmities have no part; and I am as nothing to her.'
Mary changed from red to pale, so painful was her embarrassment. What could she say in defence of her sister? How could she deny that Lesbia was an ingrate, when those rare and hurried letters, so careless in their tone, expressing the selfishness of the writer in every syllable, told but too plainly of forgetfulness and ingratitude?
'Dear grandmother, Lesbia has so much to do—her life is so full of engagements,' she faltered feebly.
'Yes, she goes from party to party—she gives herself up heart and mind and soul to pleasures which she ought to consider only as the trivial means to great ends; and she forgets the woman who reared her, and cared for her, and watched over her from her infancy, and who tried to inspire her with a noble ambition.—Yes, read to me, child, read. Give me new thoughts, if you can, for my brain is weary with grinding the old ones. There was a grand debate in the Lords last night, and Lord Hartfield spoke. Let me hear his speech. You can read what was said by the man before him; never mind the rest.'
Mary read Lord Somebody's speech, which was passing dull, but which prepared the ground for a magnificent and exhaustive reply from Lord Hartfield. The question was an important one, affecting the well-being of the masses, and Lord Hartfield spoke with an eloquence which rose in force and fire as he wound himself like a serpent into the heart of his subject—beginning quietly, soberly, with no opening flashes of rhetoric, but rising gradually to the topmost heights of oratory.
'What a speech!' cried Lady Maulevrier, delighted, her cheeks glowing, her eyes kindling; 'what a noble fellow the speaker must be! Oh, Mary, I must tell you a secret. I loved that man's father. Yes, my dear, I loved him fondly, dearly, truly, as you love that young man of yours; and he was the only man I ever really loved. Fate parted us. But I have never forgotten him—never, Mary, never. At this moment I have but to close my eyes and I can see his face—see him looking at me as he looked the last time we met. He was a younger son, poor, his future quite hopeless in those days; but it was not my fault we were parted. I would have married him—yes, wedded poverty, just as you are going to marry this Mr. Hammond; but my people would not let me; and I was too young, too helpless, to make a good fight. Oh, Mary, if I had only fought hard enough, what a happy woman I might have been, and how good a wife.'
'You were a good wife to my grandfather, I am sure,' faltered Mary, by way of saying something consolatory.