“À quoi cela servirait-il? Mademoiselle est Protestante,” replied the O’Malachy, and the words fell on Nadia’s ear without conveying any impression to her mind. She advanced towards her mother’s door, and the waiter made a hasty movement as though to prevent her from entering the room, but she passed him and went in. Then she realised what had happened.
Stepping noiselessly, she drew back the sheet from the quiet form upon the bed, and wondered at the expression of the face. Was it the hand of death alone that had stamped upon the beautiful features the serenity which had never characterised them in the stormy days of life? Or had God spoken to the soul in the silent hours of the night, when no human watcher was at hand, and the friendly and engrossing sounds of earth were hushed for the time, and was the priest’s anointing only a feeble emblem of the peace of God which passeth all understanding? Nadia felt no inclination to weep as she gazed upon the dead face. “Two hands upon the breast, and labour is past”—the Scythian proverb recurred to her mind, and she felt a sudden lightening of the load that had weighed her down since the first intimation of her mother’s danger had reached her. The issue was not hers, it belonged to God—God, who knew all the circumstances of Barbara O’Malachy’s life, the bad training, the evil influences, and in later years, the dead weight of an ill-spent past, and the constant companionship of one who owed it to her efforts that he had preferred the rewards of dishonour to a hero’s death.
What must have been the full effect of such a companionship Nadia did not wholly realise until the O’Malachy entered the room, and found her still standing and gazing entranced. She dropped the sheet as he came up to the bed.
“She looks so peaceful,” she said, with a break in her voice, “but I wish I had been here. You might have sent for me when you saw that she was worse.”
“Sure there was not time,” replied the O’Malachy, lamely enough. “It was not until daylight that I saw how nearly she was gone, and then I could think of nothing but sending for Father John immediately.”
Nadia looked at him in silence, reading in his stumbling excuses the fear which had influenced him that even at the last her mother might find means to warn her of the plot against Caerleon’s life, and understanding that this had been his reason for keeping her away. She wished now that she had braved his anger, and insisted on remaining in the room all night, and yet a quarrel in the very presence of the dying could have done no possible good to any one. She looked at him again as he stood shifting his position uneasily at the foot of the bed, and she read in his face not only the grief which she had expected to find there, but also something else, something that was more like annoyance.
“I want to speak to you, Nadia, if you’ll come into the parlour,” he said. “There are some arrangements we ought to get settled.”
“Can’t we leave them for a little while—just to-day?” asked Nadia.
“Time is a luckshury that we don’t possess,” answered her father, opening the door for her, and motioning her out. “I may likely be called away any moment.”
“Not before the—the funeral?” asked Nadia, in horror.