The penitent wife of Captain Hunsden did not long survive to enjoy her new home. Two weeks after their arrival she lay upon her death-bed. Nothing could save her. She had been doomed for months—life gave way when the excitement that had buoyed her up was gone.
By night and day Harriet watched by her bedside, and the repentant
Magdalen's last hours were the most blessed she had ever known.
"I do not deserve to die like this," she said. "Oh, my darling, your love makes my death-bed very sweet!"
They laid her in Greenwood, and once more Harriet's desolation seemed renewed.
"I am doomed to lose all I love," she thought, despairingly—"father, husband, mother—all!"
She drooped day by day, despite the tenderest care. No smile ever lighted her pale face, no happy light ever shone from the mournful dark eyes.
"Her heart is broken," said Uncle Hugh; "she will die by inches before our very eyes!"
And Uncle Hugh's prediction might have been fulfilled had not a new excitement arisen to stimulate her to renewed life and send her back to England.