"My boy! my boy!" she murmured, "my darling Rupert! Oh! it is hard, it is bitter to have to leave you."
"Mother!" with a quick look of alarm, "what is it? Are you worse?"
"No worse, Rupert; but no better. My boy, I shall never be better again in this world."
"Mother—"
"Hush, my Rupert—wait; you know it is true; and but for leaving you I should be glad to go. My life has not been so happy since your father died, Heaven knows, that I should greatly cling to it."
"But, mother, this won't do; these morbid fancies are worst of all. Keeping up one's spirits is half the battle."
"I am not morbid; I merely state a fact—a fact which must preface what is to come. Rupert, I know I am dying, and before we part I want to see my successor at Thetford Towers."
"My dear mother!" amazedly.
"Rupert, I want to see Aileen Jocyln your wife. No, no; don't interrupt me, and believe me, I dislike match-making quite as cordially as you do; but my days on earth are numbered, and I must speak before it is too late. When we were abroad I thought there never would be occasion; when we returned home I thought so, too, Rupert I have ceased to think so since May Everard's return."
The young man's face flushed suddenly and hotly, but he made no reply.