第209章

"All wrong, all wrong," she resumed; "this interview with you, among the rest. And yet--I hardly know; it cannot hurt the new ties you have formed, for I am as one dead now to this world, hovering on the brink of the next. But you /were/ my husband, Archibald; and, the last few days, I have longed for your forgiveness with a fevered longing. Oh! that the past could be blotted out! That I could wake up and find it but a hideous dream; that I were here as in old days, in health and happiness, your ever loving wife. Do you wish it, that the dark past had never had place?"

She put the question in a sharp, eager tone, gazing up to him with an anxious gaze, as though the answer must be one of life or death.

"For your sake I wish it." Calm enough were the words spoken; and her eyes fell again, and a deep sigh came forth.

"I am going to William. But Lucy and Archibald will be left. Oh, do you never be unkind to them! I pray you, visit not their mother's sin upon their heads! Do not in your love for your later children, lose your love for them!"

"Have you seen anything in my conduct that could give rise to fears of this?" he returned, reproach mingled in his sad tone. "The children are dear to me, as you once were."

"As I once was. Aye, and as I might have been now."

"Indeed you might," he answered, with emotion. "The fault was not mine."

"Archibald, I am on the very threshold of the next world. Will you not bless me--will you not say a word of love to me before I pass it! Let what I am, I say, be blotted for the moment from your memory; think of me, if you can, as the innocent, timid child whom you made your wife.

Only a word of love. My heart is breaking for it."

He leaned over her, he pushed aside the hair from her brow with his gentle hand, his tears dropping on her face. "You nearly broke mine, when you left me, Isabel," he whispered.

"May God bless you, and take you to His rest in Heaven! May He so deal with me, as I now fully and freely forgive you."

What was he about to do? Lower and lower bent his head, until his breath nearly mingled with hers. To kiss her? He best knew. But, suddenly, his face grew red with a scarlet flush, and he lifted it again. Did the form of one, then in a felon's cell at Lynneborough, thrust itself before him, or that of his absent and unconscious wife?

"To His rest in Heaven," she murmured, in the hollow tones of the departing. "Yes, yes I know that God had forgiven me. Oh, what a struggle it has been! Nothing but bad feelings, rebellion, and sorrow, and repining, for a long while after I came back here, but Jesus prayed for me, and helped me, and you know how merciful He is to the weary and heavy-laden. We shall meet again, Archibald, and live together forever and ever. But for that great hope I could hardly die.

William said mamma would be on the banks of the river, looking out for him; but it is William who is looking for me."

Mr. Carlyle released one of his hands; she had taken them both; and with his own white handkerchief, wiped the death-dew from her forehead.

"It is no sin to anticipate it, Archibald, for there will be no marrying or giving in marriage in Heaven: Christ said so. Though we do not know how it will be, my sin will be remembered no more there, and we shall be together with our children forever and forever. Keep a little corner in your heart for your poor lost Isabel."

"Yes, yes," he whispered.

"Are you leaving me?" she uttered, in a wild tone of pain.

"You are growing faint, I perceive, I must call assistance."

"Farewell, then; farewell, until eternity," she sighed, the tears raining from her eyes. "It is death, I think, not faintness. Oh! but it is hard to part! Farewell, farewell my once dear husband!"

She raised her head from the pillow, excitement giving her strength; she clung to his arm; she lifted her face in its sad yearning. Mr. Carlyle laid her tenderly down again, and suffered his wet cheek to rest upon hers.

"Until eternity."

She followed him with her eyes as he retreated, and watched him from the room: then turned her face to the wall. "It is over. Only God now."

Mr. Carlyle took an instant's counsel with himself, stopping at the head of the stairs to do it. Joyce, in obedience to a sign from him, had already gone into the sick-chamber: his sister was standing at the door.

"Cornelia."

She followed him down to the dining-room.

"You will remain here to-night? With /her/?"

"Do you suppose I shouldn't?" crossly responded Miss Corny; "where are you off to now?"

"To the telegraph office, at present. To send for Lord Mount Severn."

"What good can he do?"

"None. But I shall send for him."

"Can't one of the servants go just as well as you? You have not finished your dinner; hardly begun it."

He turned his eyes on the dinner-table in a mechanical sort of way, his mind wholly preoccupied, made some remark in answer, which Miss Corny did not catch, and went out.

On his return his sister met him in the hall, drew him inside the nearest room, and closed the door. Lady Isabel was dead. Had been dead about ten minutes.

"She never spoke after you left her, Archibald. There was a slight struggle at the last, a fighting for breath, otherwise she went off quite peacefully. I felt sure, when I first saw her this afternoon, that she could not last till midnight."