“My God, man, I can’t stop! I have been summoned post-haste to Judge Camden, who has been very strangely seized, and is thought to be dying. Let Tom Smith here ride back for my neighbor, Doctor Jenner,” and the old physician galloped past like the wind toward Golden Willows.
“Will you bring the doctor for Miss Laurens, Smith, as I am on foot, and should make poor progress?” asked Cecil, anxiously.
“Certainly, Mr. Grant, and glad to oblige you,” answered the gardener, turning his horse’s head and galloping back in the direction he had come.
Cecil walked quickly back through the high wind and flying snowflakes to the cottage, where he found Amber still wrapped in deep unconsciousness, despite all the efforts the mistress of the cottage had put forth for her recovery.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
IN HIS GRIEF AND PITY, CECIL CAME VERY NEAR TO LOVING AMBER.
During Cecil’s absence, Jasper Melrose, the husband of the kind woman at the cottage, returned on horseback from the village, and his wife begged him to see to the poor pony, lying so still in the road, under the overturned phaeton.
A moment’s examination told the truth. The gray beauty was dead, driven to exhaustion by the merciless haste of his despotic mistress.
Cecil had scarcely returned, before Tom Smith arrived with Doctor Jenner, who looked grave, as he examined the unconscious Amber, and declared that she was suffering from concussion of the brain.
“It is impossible to say just now whether she will ever rally from her swoon or not. She must be put to bed, and we will do what we can, and hope for the best,” he said.
He deftly sewed up the gaping wound on her temple, remarking that it was a great misfortune she had received it, since if she lived, it must disfigure her beauty for life with a deep scar.