CHAPTER XX.
THE SAILOR BOY'S DOOM.
"With gentle hand and soothing tongue
She bore the leech's part;
And while she o'er his sick bed hung
He paid her with his heart."—Scott.
he sunshine of a breezy June morning fell pleasantly into the chamber of the invalid. It was a bright, airy room—a perfect paradise of a sick chamber—with its snowy curtained bed, its tempting easy-chair, its white lace window curtains fluttering softly in the morning air. The odor of flowers came wafted through the open casement; and the merry chirping of a bright-winged canary, hanging in the sunshine, filled the room with its cheerful music.
Reclining in the easy-chair, gazing longingly out at the glorious sunshine, sat the young sailor whose life Gipsy had saved. His heavy dark hair fell in shining waves over his pale, intelligent brow; and his large blue eyes had a look of dreamy melancholy that few female hearts could have resisted.
Suddenly his eye lighted up, and his whole face brightened, as a clear, sweet voice, singing a gay carol, met his ear. Gipsy still retained her old habit of singing as she walked; and the next moment the door opened, and she stood, like some bright vision, before him, with cheeks glowing, eyes sparkling, and her countenance bright and radiant from her morning ride; her dark purple riding-habit setting off to the best advantage her straight, slight; rounded form; and her jaunty riding-hat, with its long, sweeping, sable plume, giving her the air of a young mountain queen, crowned with vitality, and sceptered with life and beauty.
"Oh, I have had such a charming canter over the hills this morning," she cried, with her wild, breezy laugh. "How I wished you had been well enough to accompany me. Mignonne fairly flew, leaping over yawning chasms and rocks as though he felt not the ground beneath him. But I am forgetting—how do you feel this morning?"