“If you will give me leave, sir, I will walk down to the rectory, and bring you word how the doctor is. That will save you the necessity of going out so late.”
“Very good, very good, do so, I am anxious to hear some more particular account.”
Lord Spoonbill then departed for the rectory. And, when having heard what was the nature of the rector’s illness, he had reason to apprehend that the hand of death was upon him, the young lord was more deeply moved. He really did make anxious haste to the parsonage. It is a great pity that he did not pay more attention to these frequent admonitions which he received as it were from his better genius, and by which he was reminded that good principles were not altogether foreign to his nature; but he resisted them—he felt “a dread of shame among the spirits beneath.”
CHAPTER VI.
When his lordship arrived at the rectory, he found the door standing open, and the lower apartments of the house deserted. While he was hesitating whether he should seek his way to the doctor’s apartment, one of the domestics made her appearance, and his lordship very earnestly inquired after the afflicted pastor. With deep and unaffected feeling she replied, that her dear master was very, very ill, and with increased emotion continued—
“Oh, my lord, if you will see him, perhaps he may know you—he may try to speak.”
“Certainly I will see him. How long is it since he was taken?”
“Only two hours, my lord. He was quite well this afternoon at five o’clock, and then he went into his study, where he always goes about that time, and we heard nothing of him till about two hours since; his bell rang, and I went, your lordship, to see what my master wanted, and there I saw him sitting in his great chair quite speechless.”
The poor woman was overcome with her own emotion, and Lord Spoonbill hastened to the room into which the patient had been removed. When he entered the apartment, he saw by the light of one dim candle, and a recently kindled fire, the figure of Dr Greendale sitting in an easy chair, in a state of apparent insensibility, and on one side of him sat Mrs Greendale, grasping his hand with convulsive eagerness, and looking anxiously on his still and frozen features: how like and how unlike what he was! On the other side Penelope was kneeling, holding him also by the hand, and hiding her face, that its expression of deep feeling might not needlessly distress her aunt. Gentle sobbings were heard, and the hard breathings of the death-stricken man. His lordship stood for a few seconds as if rivetted to the spot where his eye first caught the sight of the melancholy group. Mrs Greendale first noticed the presence of a stranger, and recognised his lordship, who then advanced with slow and gentle step towards the sick man, and silently took the hand of Mrs Greendale, whose tears then flowed afresh, as with louder sobbings she exclaimed—
“Oh, my lord, what a sight is here! Those dear eyes have been fixed as they are now for hours. He was a good man, my lord; such a heart! such tenderness! Oh, he cannot, he cannot continue long! Oh, that I should live to see this!”