And so they find them half an hour later: he, like one crazed, with a face as ashen-white as her own, clasping a lifeless woman to his breast.
[CHAPTER XLII.]
Lifeless! Yes! But there are two kinds of lifelessness: one from which there is no back-coming—one from which there is. Esther's is the latter. Although a member of that fraternity whose province it is to kill and to make alive has sapiently said of her, "She will die!—she has not week to live!" Mother Nature has made answer, "She shall not die; I will save her alive! She has yet many years." And Esther lives. For many days, it is hard to predicate of her whether she be dead or alive; so faintly does the wave of life heave to and fro in her breast—so lowly does life's candle burn. But though the candle burn low, it is not blown out. By-and-bye strength gathers itself again, and comes back to pulse and vein and limb.
At seventeen life holds us so fast in his embrace that he will hardly let us go. To the sick child there come sweet sleeps; there comes a desire for food—a pleasure in the dusty sunbeam streaming through the window—in the mote playing up and down on ceiling and wall. I marvel will the bliss of spirits at the Resurrection dawn, feeling the clothing of pure new bodies, surpass the delight that attends the renewal of the old body at the uprising from a great sickness? The blanket that hung between Esther and all objects of sensation is withdrawn: full consciousness returns, and remembrance; and in their company, untold shame—shame at not having died! The celandine's greenish buds are unclosing into little brazen wide-awake flowers in the hedge-banks: the crocuses in the garden-borders hold up their gold chalices to catch the gentle February rain and the mild February sunbeams; in the wood-hollows the mercury—spring's earliest herald—flourishes, thick and frequent, its stout green shoots. About the meadows, small gawky lambs make a feeble "ba-a-a-ing." It is drawing towards sundown. The window is open; and near it, on a beech bough, a thrush sits, singing a loud sweet even-song.
Esther has been fully dressed for the first time, and has been moved into an adjoining dressing-room. In the small change of scene, there is, to her, intense delight—delight even in the changed pattern on the walls, in the different shape of the chairs—even in the brass handles of the old oak chest of drawers. Every power seems new and fresh—every sensation exquisitely keen; in every exercise of sight and sound and touch there is conscious joy. She has been amusing herself making little tests of her strength. She lifts a book that lies on the table beside her; it is small and light, but to her it seems over-heavy; she has to take two hands to it. She makes a pilgrimage from her arm-chair to the window—she has to catch at the wall, at the furniture, for support; but she gets there at last, and, sitting down on the window-seat, looks out at the quiet sky, blackened with home-coming rooks—at the pool made flame-red by the westering sun—at the peeping roof of the distant deer-barn. That little bit of roof brings a flood of recollections to her, and first and foremost amongst them stands St. John and her last interview with him. Although she is quite alone, a torrent of red invades cheeks and throat and brow, even to the roots of her hair. "I sent for him," she says to herself, with a sort of gasp; "I asked him to kiss me, and I did not die! How horrible! I must never see him again." Then she falls to thinking about him: whether he is still in the house? whether he has made up his differences with Miss Blessington? whether he is very joyful at her own recovery? whether he is not penetrated with the ridiculousness of her impressive leave-taking, which, after all—oh bathos!—was no leave-taking at all? "He must never hear me mentioned again," she says, twisting her hands nervously together. "Perhaps he will forget it in time; perhaps he will not tell any one about it. How soon shall I be well enough to go?—in a week? five days? four? three?—and whither am I to go?"
Aye, whither, Miss Craven? There are but two alternatives for her—the Union and Plas Berwyn. She must swallow her pride, and return to the Brandons: to the long prayers; to the half-past six tea and bread and scrape; to the three bits of bacon at breakfast; and to the perusal of the Record and the Rock: she must induce Mrs. Brandon again to advertise for a situation in a pious family. This morning's post has brought her four pages of doctrine, reproof, and instruction from Miss Bessy, and, lurking within them, has come a short, sweet, metrical prayer, adapted to every Christian's daily use:
"My heart is like a rusty lock,
Lord, oil it with Thy grace;
And rub, and rub, and rub it, Lord,
Till I can see Thy face."
There is no time like the present; she will write now. She has drawn paper and pens towards her, when the door opens, and her friend the housemaid enters. Doctor and nurse have fled,