Winifred stood between the two, the wife sobbing wildly behind her, her brother looking at her in a sort of dull despair, and stretched out her hands to them with an appeal for which she could find no words. But at that moment the door opened harshly and Tom came in, appearing at the end of the room, with a pale and gloomy countenance, made only more gloomy by wine and fatigue, for he had ridden far and wildly, dashing about the country to exhaust his rage and disappointment. All that he had done had been to increase both. “Oh, you have got here,” he said, with an angry nod to his brother. “It is a nice home-coming ain’t it, for you and me? Shake hands; we’re in the same boat now, whatever we once were. And there stands the supplanter, the hypocrite that has got everything!” cried the excited young man, the foam flying from his mouth. And thereupon came a shriek from Mrs. George, which went through poor Winifred like a knife. For some minutes she heard no more.
CHAPTER XV
WINIFRED had never fainted before in her life, and it made a great commotion in the house. Hopkins, without a word to any one, sent off for Dr. Langton, and half the maids in the house poured into the room eagerly to help, bringing water, eau de Cologne, everything they could think of. Mrs. George’s hysterics fled before the alarming sight, the insensibility, and pallor, which for a moment she took for death, and with a cry of horror and pity, and the tears still standing upon her flushed cheeks, she flung herself on her knees on the floor by Winifred’s side. The two brothers stood and looked on, feeling very uncomfortable, gazing with a half-guilty aspect upon the fallen figure. Would any one perhaps say that it was their fault? They stood near each other, though without exchanging a word, while the sudden irruption of women poured in. Winifred, however, was not long of coming to her senses. She woke to find herself lying on the floor, to her great astonishment, in the midst of a little crowd, and then struggled back into full consciousness again with a head that ached and throbbed, and something singing in her ears. She got to her feet with an effort and begged their pardon faintly. “What has happened?” she said; “have I done any thing strange? what have I done?”
“You have only fainted,” said Miss Farrell, “that is all. Miss Chester is better now. She has no more need of you, you may all go. Yes, my dear, you have fainted, that is all. Some girls are always doing it; but it never happened to you before, and it ought to be a proof to you, Winnie, that you are only mortal after all, and can’t do more than you can.”
Winifred smiled as best she could in the face of her old friend. “I did not know I could be so foolish,” she said; “but it is all over now. Dear Miss Farrell, leave me with them. There is something I must say.”
“Oh, put it off till to-morrow,” said Mrs. George; “whether you’ve been our enemy or not, you are only a bit of a girl; and it can’t hurt to wait till to-morrow. I know what nerves are myself, I’ve always been a dreadful sufferer. A dead faint like that, it is very frightening to other people. Don’t send the old lady away.”
“I am going to stay with you, Winnie—unless you will be advised by me, and by Mrs. George, who has a kind heart, I am sure she has—and go to bed.”
Winifred placed herself in a deep easy-chair which gave her at least a physical support. She gave her hand to Miss Farrell, who stood by her, and turned to the brothers, who were still looking on uneasily, half-conscious that it was their fault, half-defiant of her and all that she could say. She lifted her eyes to them, in that moment of weakness and uncertainty before the world settled back into its place. Even their faces for a little while were but part of a phantasmagoria that moved and trembled in the air around her. She felt herself as in a dream, seeing not only what was before her, but many a visionary scene behind. She had been the youngest, she had always yielded to the boys; and as they stood before her thus, though with so few features of the young playfellows and tyrants to whom all her life she had been more or less subject, it became more and more impossible to her to assume the different part which an ill fate had laid upon her. As she looked at them, so many scenes came back. They had been fond of her and good to her in their way, when she was a child. She suddenly remembered how George used to carry her up and down-stairs when she was recovering from the fever which was the great event in her childish life, and in how many rides and rows she had been Tom’s companion, grateful above measure for his notice. These facts, with a hundred trivial incidents which she had forgotten, rushed back upon her mind. “Boys,” she said, and then paused, her eyes growing clearer and clearer, but tears getting into her voice.
“Come, Winnie,” said George, “Tom and I are a little too old for that.”
“You will never be too old for that to me,” she said. “Oh, if you would but look a little kind, as you used to do! It was against my will and my prayers that it was left to me. I said that I would not accept it, that I would never, never, take what was yours. I never deceived him in that. Oh, boys! do you think it is not terrible for me to be put into your place, even for a moment? And that is not the worst. I thought when I sent for you that I could give it you back, that it would all be easy; but there is more to tell you.”