“Do try to get a little rest first, Hadria; your watch is next, and you must not go to it fagged out.”
“I know, but I feel full of dread. I must just go and see that all is right.”
“Then I will come too,” said Algitha.
They stole down stairs together, in the dim light of the oil lamps that were kept burning all night. The clock struck the half-hour as they passed along the landing. A strange fancy came to Hadria, that a dusky figure drifted away before her, as she advanced. It seemed as though death had receded at her approach. The old childish love for her mother had revived in all its force, during this long fight with the reaper of souls. She felt all her energies strung with the tension of battle. She fought against a dark horror that she could not face. Knowing, and realising vividly, that if her mother lived, her own dreams were ended for ever, she wrestled with desperate strength for the life that was at stake. Her father’s silent wretchedness was terrible to see. He would not hear a word of doubt as to the patient’s recovery. He grew angry if anyone hinted at danger. He insisted that his wife was better each day. She would soon be up and well again.
“Never well again,” the doctor had confided to Hubert, “though she may possibly pull through.”
Mr. Fullerton’s extravagant hopefulness sent a thrill along the nerves. It was as if he had uttered the blackest forebodings. The present crisis had stirred a thousand feelings and associations, in Hadria, which had long been slumbering. She seemed to be sent back again, to the days of her childhood. The intervening years were blotted out. She realized now, with agonising vividness, the sadness of her mother’s life, the long stagnation, the slow decay of disused faculties, and the ache that accompanies all processes of decay, physical or moral. Not only the strong appeal of old affection, entwined with the earliest associations, was at work, but the appeal of womanhood itself:—the grey sad story of a woman’s life, bare and dumb and pathetic in its irony and pain: the injury from without, and then the self-injury, its direct offspring; unnecessary, yet inevitable; the unconscious thirst for the sacrifice of others, the hungry claims of a nature unfulfilled, the groping instinct to bring the balance of renunciation to the level, and indemnify oneself for the loss suffered and the spirit offered up. And that propitiation had to be made. It was as inevitable as that the doom of Orestes should follow the original crime of the house of Atreus. Hadria’s whole thought and strength were now centred on the effort to bring about that propitiation, in her own person. She prepared the altar and sharpened the knife. In that subtle and ironical fashion, her fate was steadily at work.
The sick-room was very still when the sisters entered. It was both warm and fresh. A night-light burnt on the table, where cups and bottles were ranged, a spirit-lamp and kettle, and other necessaries. The night-light threw long, stealthy shadows over the room. The fire burnt with a red glow. The bed lay against the long wall. As the two figures entered, there was a faint sound of quick panting, and a moan. Hadria rushed to the bedside.
“Quick, quick, some brandy,” she called. Algitha flew to the table for the brandy, noticing with horror, as she passed, that the nurse had fallen asleep at her post. Algitha shook her hastily.
“Go and call Mr. Fullerton,” she said sharply, “and quick, quick.” The patient was sinking. The nurse vanished. Algitha had handed the cup of brandy to Hadria. The sisters stood by the bedside, scarcely daring to breathe. Mr. Fullerton entered hurriedly, with face pallid and drawn.
“What is it? Is she——?”