For a while she lay thinking, and as she thought, a sad scene came back to her, a night when her hot hands had been enfolded in those of the dead, and that dead her grandfather. Was it true, or was she laboring under some hallucination of the brain? If true, was that white, pallid face still to be seen in the room below, or had they buried him from her sight? She would know, and with a strange kind of nervous strength she rose, and throwing on the wrapper and slippers which lay near, descended the stairs, wondering to find herself so weak, and half shuddering at the deep stillness of the house—a stillness broken only by the ticking of the clock and the purring of the house cat, which at sight of Maddy arose from its position near the door and came forward, rubbing its sides against her dress, and trying in various ways to evince its joy at seeing one whose caresses it had missed so long. The little bed-room off the kitchen, where grandpa slept and died, was vacant; the old-fashioned coat was put away, as was every vestige of the old man, save the broad-rimmed hat which hung upon the wall just where his hands had hung it, and which looked so much like its owner that with a gush of tears Maddy sank upon the bed, moaning to herself, “Yes, grandpa is dead. I remember now. But Uncle Joseph, where is he? Can he too have died without my knowledge?” and she looked around in vain for the lunatic, not a trace of whom was to be found.
His room was in perfect order, as was everything about the house, showing that Flora was still the domestic goddess, while Maddy detected also various things which she recognized as having come from Aikenside. Who sent them? Did Guy, and had he been there too while she was sick? The thought brought a throb of joy to Maddy’s heart, but it soon passed away as she began again to wonder if Uncle Joseph, too, had died, and where Flora was. It was not far to the Honedale burying-ground, and Maddy could see the head-stones gleaming through the August sunlight; could discern her mother’s, and knew that two fresh mounds at least were made beside it. But were there three? Was Uncle Joseph there? By stealing across the meadow in the rear of the house the distance to the graveyard was shortened more than half, and could not be more than the eighth part of a mile. She could walk so far, she knew. The fresh air would do her good, and hunting up her long unused hat, the impatient girl started, stopping once or twice to rest as a dizzy faintness came over her, and then continuing on until the spot she sought was reached. There were three graves, one old and sunken, one made when the last winter’s snow was on the hills, the other fresh and new. That was all. Uncle Joseph was not there, and vague terror entered Maddy’s heart lest he had been taken back to the asylum.
“I will get him out,” she said; “I will take care of him. I should die with nothing to do; and I promised grandpa——”
She could get no further, for the rush of memories which came over her, and seating herself upon the ground close to the new grave, she laid her face upon it, and sobbed piteously:
“Oh, grandpa, I’m so lonely without you all; I almost wish I was lying here in the quiet yard.”
Then a storm of tears ensued, after which Maddy grew calm, and with her head still bent down did not hear the rapid step coming down the grassy road, past the marble tomb-stones, to where she was crouching upon the ground. There it stopped, and in a half whisper some one called, “Maddy! Maddy!”
Then she started, and lifting up her head saw before her Guy Remington. For a moment she regarded him intently, while he said to her, kindly, pityingly:
“Poor child, you have suffered so much, and I never knew of it till a few days ago.”
At the sound of that loved voice speaking thus to her, everything else was forgotten, and with a cry of joy Maddy stretched her hands toward him, moaning out:
“Oh, Guy, Guy, where have you been, when I wanted you so much?”