"In point of education, Virgie, you are fitted for the proudest position that could be offered you," her father returned, with some spirit. "All that you need is a trifle more worldly polish, which you will readily gain as Sir William takes you into society, and I am proud to give you to him. God bless you both, my children."
His voice broke.
He would have been glad to go with her to the scenes of her new life, to watch her develop in a higher atmosphere and see her happiness in her proud position. But he knew it could not be; and overcome, for the moment, with the thought of the separation which must soon come, he turned abruptly away and went feebly back to the cottage.
Chapter VIII.
Mr. Abbot Desires an Immediate Marriage.
Whether it was owing to the excitement of the previous evening, or to a feeling of relief from care and anxiety upon Virgie's account which made Mr. Abbot feel that at last he might safely lay down his burdens, it would be impossible to say, but he was alarmingly ill the morning after the betrothal, and unable to rise from his bed.
His strength seemed to have left him, and he lay weak as a child, panting with every breath, a deadly faintness and sinking sensation frequently seizing him and making him feel as if the world was rapidly slipping from his grasp.
Virgie was in an agony of fear.
She had never seen her father so ill before, and it seemed to her that he must die if he did not soon have relief.
"What shall I do?" she asked, in a helpless, appealing way, of Sir William.
He had been summoned as soon as Mr. Abbot's condition had been discovered, and he, too, feared that the end was very near, while, being wholly unaccustomed to sickness of any kind, he felt very useless and inefficient.