“TO MY AIN COUNTREE.”
“How should I be glad,
Henceforth in all the world at anything?”
Enid.
THE sad days that intervened between Colonel Methvyn’s death and his funeral went by slowly. But they wore through at last, and Cicely woke one morning to realise that “all was over,” as runs the common phrase; the worn-out garment of the father she had loved so devotedly laid reverently aside, nothing more to be done for him, no letters to be written, no books to be read, none of the countless little tender daily services which his long ill-health had called for, to be remembered and cheerfully performed!
It was a page torn out of the book of her life, and just now it seemed to her that the wrench had loosened and disfigured all the others.
“I have mother,” she reflected; “but mother will never be more than half in this world now. People say she is bearing it wonderfully. Sir Thomas says he is amazed at her energy and composure; but I know her better. She is only keeping up for me. I cannot count upon her, my only one object in life, for long.”
But though Cicely believed her heart to be almost broken, though the iron had entered deeply into her soul, she yet felt ready for what was before her. Not for one instant had she wavered in the resolution which she had come to on the night of the Lingthurst ball.
“When my father’s funeral is over, I will see Trevor and tell him all I know,” she had determined. And so strong upon her was the impression of the inevitable result of her discovery, that the possible effect upon her relations with Mr. Fawcett of her loss of fortune had never even occurred to her. She was proud, as Sir Thomas had said, but her pride was of a different nature from that of which her kind old friend had suspected the existence.
Not that she was now indifferent to the change in her position. It was beginning to come home to her. Already some faint realisation of what it would be was making itself felt. For her mother’s sake she trembled at the thought of possible poverty and privation. The ignorance and inexperience which at first had rendered her indifferent to this part of the calamity, now that the reaction had set in, exaggerated to her imagination the practical results of it. But to her mother she showed no shadow of misgiving.
“My settlements are secure, you know, my darling,” said poor Mrs. Methvyn. “There will be certainly enough for me to live upon with perfect comfort. And Sir Thomas is so kind; he says nobody need know much about our affairs if, as he wishes, he can arrange to take Greystone off our hands. It will probably still be your home.”