"Forgive me!" he said, pathetically—"I am afraid I have been a trouble to you! I've been studying too much this afternoon,—and— and—I don't know why I came out here just now—I'll—I'll go in. Will you let me know how—how—-"
Forsyth nodded comprehensively.
"You shall know everything—best or worst—to-morrow,"—he said—
"But now go in and lie down, Walden! You want rest!"
At an imperative sign from him, Walden obediently turned away, not daring to look at the men that now passed him, carrying Maryllia's senseless form back to Abbot's Manor, the beloved home from which she had ridden forth so gaily that morning. He re-entered the still open doorway of his rectory, wholly unconscious that his parishioners, deeply affected by his strange and sudden mind- bewilderment, were now all as anxious about him as they were about Maryllia,—he was too dazed to see that the faithful Bainton still waited for him on his own threshold, or that his servant Hester was still crying as though her heart would break. He passed all and everyone—and went straight upstairs to his own bedroom, where he closed and locked the door. There, smiling down upon him was the portrait of his dead sister,—and there too, just above his bed was an engraving of the tragically sweet Head crowned with thorns, of Guido's 'Ecce Homo.' On this his gaze rested abstractedly. His temples ached and throbbed, and there was a dull cold heaviness at his heart. Keeping his eyes still on the pictured face of Christ, he dropped on his knees, clasped his hands, and tried to pray, but could not. How should he appeal to a God who was cruel enough to kill a bright creature like Maryllia in the very zenith and fair flowering-time of her womanhood!—an innocent happy soul that had no thought or wish to do anyone any harm! And then he remembered his own reproaches to his friend Bishop Brent whom he had accused of selfishness for allowing his life to be swayed by the memory of an inconsolable sorrow and loss. 'You draw a mourning veil of your own across the very face of God!' So he had said,—and was he not ready now to do the same? Suddenly, like the teasing refrain of a haunting melody, there came back to his mind the verse he had read that morning:
"As she fled fast thro' sun and shade,
The happy winds upon her play'd,
Blowing the ringlet from the braid:
She look'd so lovely as she sway'd
The rein with dainty finger-tips.
A man had given all other bliss,
And all his worldly wealth for this,
To waste his whole heart in one kiss
Upon her perfect lips."
Over and over these rhymes went, jingling their sweet concord in his brain,—till all at once the strong pressure upon his soul relaxed,- -a great sigh escaped his lips—and with the sigh came the sudden breaking of the wave of grief. A rush of scalding tears blinded his eyes—and with a hard sob of agony his head fell forward on his clasped hands.
"Spare me her life, O God!" he passionately prayed—"Oh God, oh God!
Save Guinevere!"
XXX
And now a cloud of heavy sorrow and foreboding hung over the little village. All its inhabitants were oppressed by a dreary sense of helpless wretchedness and personal loss. Maryllia was not dead,—but it was to be feared that she was dying,—slowly, and by inches as it were, yet nevertheless surely. A great specialist had been summoned from London by Dr. Forsyth, and after long and earnest consultation, his verdict upon her case had been well-nigh hopeless. Thereupon Cicely Bourne was immediately sent for, and arrived from Paris in all haste, only to fall into a state of utter despair. For there seemed no possible chance of saving the dear and valuable life of her beloved friend and protectress to whom she owed all her happiness, all her future prospects. And thus confronted with a tragedy more dire and personal than any she had ever pictured in her wildest imaginative efforts, she sat by Maryllia's bedside, hour after hour, day after day, night after night, stunned by grief, watching, weeping, and waiting for the least glimmer of returning consciousness in that unconscious form which lay so terribly inert, like a figure of life-in-death before her, till she became the mere gaunt, little ghost of herself, her large melancholy dark eyes alone expressing the burning vital anguish of her soul. A telegram conveying the sad news of her niece's accident had been sent to Mrs. Fred Vancourt at the Gezireh Palace Hotel, Cairo, to which, with the happy vagueness which so often characterizes the ultra-fashionable woman, Mrs. Fred had replied direct to Maryllia herself thus:
"So glad to know where you really are at last, but sorry you have met with a spill. Hope you have a good doctor and nurses. Will write on return from expedition to Luxor. Lord Roxmouth much regrets to hear of accident and thinks it lucky you are back in your own home."