Leonard (in great amaze, contrasting his ideal of the writer of these musical lines in that graceful hand, with his homely, uneducated mother, who can neither read nor write.)—"Your sister—is it possible? My aunt, then. How comes it you never spoke of her before? Oh, you should be so proud of her, mother."
Mrs. Fairfield (clasping her hands).—"We were proud of her, all of us—father, mother,—all! She was so beautiful and so good, and not proud she! though she looked like the first lady in the land. Oh! Nora, Nora!"
Leonard (after a pause).—"But she must have been highly educated?"
Mrs. Fairfield.—"'Deed she was!"
Leonard.—"How was that?"
Mrs. Fairfield (rocking herself to and fro in her chair).—"Oh! my Lady was her godmother—Lady Lansmere I mean—and took a fancy to her when she was that high! and had her to stay at the Park, and wait on her ladyship; and then she put her to school, and Nora was so clever that nothing would do but she must go to London as a governess. But don't talk of it, boy!—don't talk of it!"
Leonard.—"Why not, mother?—what has become of her?—where is she?"
Mrs. Fairfield (bursting into a paroxysm of tears).—"In her grave—in her cold grave! Dead, dead!"
Leonard was inexpressibly grieved and shocked. It is the attribute of the poet to seem always living, always a friend. Leonard felt as if some one very dear had been suddenly torn from his heart. He tried to console his mother; but her emotion was contagious, and he wept with her.
"And how long has she been dead?" he asked at last, in mournful accents.