A PASTORALE.
By DARLEY DALE, Author of “Fair Katherine,” etc.
CHAPTER XIV.
hen Jack was gone, Mrs. Shelley insisted on Fairy’s going to bed, for the child was worn out with fatigue and excitement, and she and John watched by Charlie’s couch in turns through the short summer night, which, short as it was, seemed all too long when spent in anxiously watching for a change which did not come. Once, and once only during the night, did Charlie open his eyes and murmur, “Where am I?” but before the shepherd, who was sitting by him, had time to answer, he had again relapsed into unconsciousness.
From the first John Shelley had taken a hopeful view, and even this momentary return to consciousness filled him with hope; the next interval might be longer perhaps; at any rate, it was a favourable sign in the shepherd’s opinion. At four o’clock Mrs. Shelley came to take her husband’s place, and then, to her surprise, he told her he was going to walk to the nearest point where the London coach passed and give Jack the latest bulletin before he started.
And so, to Jack’s joy and amazement, the first time the coach paused to take up the Lewes letters, there stood his father by the inn door, waiting to speak to him. In a moment Jack, who, with Mr. Leslie, was occupying the boxseat, was down on the ground grasping his father’s hand and eagerly asking what news.
“No worse, Jack; if anything, a trifle better; he was conscious for a few moments last night; just opened his eyes and said ‘Where am I?’ but I knew you would like to hear the latest news, as you can’t have a letter till you get to New York, and I don’t know how long that will be after you arrive there.”
“Oh, I’ll let you know all about the mails, shepherd, when I come back. Come, Jack,” called out Mr. Leslie, from the box.
“God bless you, my boy, and grant we may meet again someday,” said the shepherd, wringing Jack’s hand, and then the lad, with tears in his eyes, jumped back to his place, the coachman cracked his whip, and in a few minutes nothing remained but a cloud of dust, through which John Shelley was straining his eyes to catch a last glimpse of his eldest son.