Graeme stood gazing at her sister, and in a little Janet spoke again.
“Miss Graeme, you canna mind your aunt Marian?”
No, Graeme could not.
“Menie is growing very like her, I think. She was bonnier than your mother even, and she kept her beauty to the very last. You ken the family werena well pleased when your mother married, and the sisters didna meet often till Miss Marian grew ill. They would fain have had her away to Italy, or some far awa’ place, but nothing would content her but just her sister, her sister, and so she came home to the manse. That was just after I came back again, after Sandy was weaned; and kind she was to me, the bonny, gentle creature that she was.
“For a time she seemed better, and looked so blooming—except whiles, and aye so bonny, that not one of them all could believe that she was going to die. But one day she came in from the garden, with a bonny moss-rose in her hand—the first of the season—and she said to your mother she was wearied, and lay down; and in a wee while, when your mother spoke to her again, she had just strength to say that she was going, and that she wasna feared, and that was all. She never spoke again.”
Janet paused to wipe the tears from her face.
“She was good and bonny, and our Menie, the dear lammie, has been growing very like her this while. She ’minds me on her now, with the long lashes lying over her cheeks. Miss Marian’s cheeks aye reddened that way when she slept. Her hair wasna so dark as our Menie’s, but it curled of itself, like hers.”
Mrs Nasmyth turned grave pitying eyes toward Graeme, as she ceased speaking. Graeme’s heart gave a sudden painful throb, and she went very pale.
“Janet,” said she, with difficulty, “there is not much the matter with my sister, is there? It wasna that you meant about changes! Menie’s not going to die like our bonny Aunt Marian!” Her tones grew shrill and incredulous as she went on.
“I cannot tell. I dinna ken—sometimes I’m feared to think how it may end. But oh! Miss Graeme—my darling—”