In a minute she was standing on the steps that went down to the wide door of the house. It was not open as she had found it once before, when she came to him with her troubles. But when it opened at the sound of the bell, she gave the servant no time to say as usual, that her master could see no one; but passing her softly and quickly, sprang upstairs like a bird. It was still quite light out of doors, but the passage was dark, and so was the room into which she went. There was a fire in the grate, however; and before she saw Mr St. Cyr, she saw his shadow on the wall, and paused a moment to get breath. Then as she heard a footstep at the door, she came forward. Mr St. Cyr must have been asleep, she thought, for at first he looked at her in a wondering way, as though he did not know her, and she therefore hastened to speak.
“Are you better, Cousin Cyprien?”
“It is not Theresa—is it?” said he, with little pauses between the words, as though he did not find it easy to utter them.
“Not Theresa, but Fred. Are you better, cousin?”
“Ah! my little cousin—who comes to me—in her trouble—but who does not come to me in mine.”
“I have been here often, but you were too ill to see me, they said always. Are you better now?”
“Yes—I am better, I think. Once they told me—I was dying—” He paused.
“And were you afraid, Cousin Cyprien?” said Frederica, looking with awe into his changed face.
“Was it fear that I felt? There was fear, and a thrill of something that was not fear. Now—I said—I shall know the mystery of death—and the beyond.”
“Cousin, mania was not afraid. Even at the last, when death was very near, she was not afraid, because—”