Innocent had risen—she had laid the cold hand of the corpse back on its breast—and she stood gazing vacantly before her in utter misery.
"Nothing to be done?" she faltered—"Do you mean that you cannot rouse him? Will he never speak to me again?"
The doctor looked at her gravely and kindly.
"Not in this world, my dear," he said—"in the next—perhaps! Let us hope so!"
She put her hand up to her forehead with a bewildered gesture.
"He is dead!" she cried—"Dead! Oh, Robin, Robin! I can't believe it!—it isn't true! Dad, dear Dad! My only friend! Good-bye—good-bye, Dad!—good-bye, Briar Farm—good-bye to everything—oh, Dad!"
Her voice quavered and broke in a passion of tears.
"I loved him as if he were my own father," she sobbed. "And he loved me as if I were his own child! Oh, Dad, darling Dad! We can never love each other again!"
CHAPTER VIII
The news of Farmer Jocelyn's sudden death was as though a cloud-burst had broken over the village, dealing utter and hopeless destruction. To the little community of simple workaday folk living round Briar Farm it was a greater catastrophe than the death of any king. Nothing else was talked of. Nothing was done. Men stood idly about, looking at each other in a kind of stupefied consternation,—women chattered and whispered at their cottage doors, shaking their heads with all that melancholy profundity of wisdom which is not wise till after the event,—the children were less noisy in their play, checked by the grave faces of their parents—the very dogs seemed to know that something had occurred which altered the aspect of ordinary daily things. The last of the famous Jocelyns was no more! It seemed incredible. And Briar Farm? What would become of Briar Farm?