Softly Halbert stole across the room, and bade Charles go; as soon as he could leave Forsyth he promised that he would return home, but it might be long ere he could do that, and he called the nurse, who was waiting without the door, to see how her patient slept. She looked at him in amazement. Nor was the wonder less of the doctor, who came almost immediately after—he could not have deemed such a thing possible, and if it continued long, it yet might save his life, spent and wasted as he was; but he must still be kept in perfect quietness. Halbert took his station at the bedside as the doctor and nurse left the room, and shading Forsyth’s face with the thin curtain, he leant back, and gave himself up for a time to the strange whirl of excited feeling which followed. The memories so long buried, so suddenly and powerfully awakened; the image of this man, as he once was, and what he was now. Compassion, interest, hope, all circled about that slumbering figure, till Halbert’s anxiety found vent in its accustomed channel, prayer. The night wore slowly on, hour after hour pealed from neighbouring clocks till the chill grey dawn of morn crept into the sick-room, making the solitary watcher shiver with its breath of piercing cold; and not until the morning was advanced, till smoke floated over every roof, and the bustle of daily life had begun once more, did the poor slumberer awake. Wonderingly, as he opened his eyes, did he gaze on Halbert: wonderingly and wistfully, as the events of the past night came up before him in confused recollections, and he perceived that Halbert, who bent over him with enquiries, had watched by his side all night. Forsyth shaded his eyes with his thin hand, and murmured a half weeping acknowledgment of thankfulness, “This from you, Melville, this from you!”
CHAPTER III.
Hope the befriending,
Does what she can, for she points evermore up to heaven, and faithful
Plunges her anchor’s peak in the depths of the grave, and beneath it
Paints a more beautiful world * * * *
* * * Then praise we our Father in Heaven,
Him, who has given us more; for to us has Hope been illumined;
Groping no longer in night; she is Faith, she is living assurance;
Faith is enlighten’d hope; she is light, is the eye of affection;
Dreams of the longing interprets, and carves their visions in marble;
Faith is the sun of life; and her countenance shines like the Prophet’s,
For she has look’d upon God.—Evangeline.
HERE were anxious enquiries mingling with the glad welcome which Halbert Melville received as he entered his own house on that clear cold winter’s morning,—for the evening’s rain had passed away, and frost had set in once more—enquiries that showed the interest which both his own Mary and Christian—for Christian’s society, though she did not allow it to be monopolised by either, was claimed in part by both the Marys, and her time divided between them—felt in the unhappy sufferer.
“Does Mary know, Christian?” was one of Halbert’s first questions.