A low cry shrilled through the room, and old Maria shuddered at the strange sound, it was so distinctly malicious, so frankly glad.
"Ma'am!" she uttered, indignantly; and Mrs. Fielding half raised herself on her pillow, and exclaimed:
"Daisy Forrest dead! My rival dead! Ah, that is glorious news!"
Maria's old black face turned gray with indignant emotion.
"Hush, missie! You ought to be afraid to talk so. De good Lord might punish your hardness of heart."
"Hold your tongue, Maria! You know I hated that woman. You know that she was my rival—that she held my husband's heart—yet you ask me not to be glad she is dead!"
Her black eyes blazed luridly, and her pale, beautiful face writhed with jealousy, as, almost breathless, she fell back upon her pillow, and Maria hurriedly seized a bottle of camphor and began to bathe her brow and hands.
"Honey, you knowed all dis afore you married my young master; so, what for you want to take on so now?" she whimpered, reproachfully.
"Yes, I knew it all; but they told me that it was the way of young men to be wild before marriage—that he would cast her off when he became my husband, and hate her very memory. But it was false; he loved that wicked, fallen creature best always. He would breathe her name in his sleep as he lay by my side. He visited her still—"
"No, no, missie; dat pore gal not so bad as dat! She nebber 'low him to come no more arter he married you," interrupted Maria.