"Oh, I know. I know by the fuss there is over me. You heard what Hannah said the other night."

"What? When?"

"When she brought in the tea, and I was lying on the rug. I was not asleep, though you thought I was. You told her she ought to be more cautious, for that I might not have been asleep."

"I don't remember much about it," said Lady Isabel, at her wits' ends how to remove the impression Hannah's words must have created, had he indeed heard them. "Hannah talks great nonsense sometimes."

"She said I was going on fast to the grave."

"Did she? n.o.body attends to Hannah. She is only a foolish girl. We shall soon have you well, when the warm weather comes."

"Madame Vine."

"Well, my darling?"

"Where's the use of your trying to deceive me? Do you think I don't see that you are doing it? I'm not a baby; you might if it were Archibald.

What is it that's the matter with me?"

"Nothing. Only you are not strong. When you get strong again, you will be as well as ever."

William shook his head in disbelief. He was precisely that sort of child from whom it is next to impossible to disguise facts; quick, thoughtful, observant, and advanced beyond his years. Had no words been dropped in his hearing, he would have suspected the evil, by the care evinced for him, but plenty of words had been dropped; hints, by which he had gathered suspicion; broad a.s.sertions, like Hannah's, which had too fully supplied it; and the boy in his inmost heart, knew as well that death was coming for him as that death itself did.

"Then, if there's nothing the matter with me, why could not Dr. Martin speak to you before me to-day? Why did he send me into the other room while he told you what he thought? Ah, Madame Vine, I am as wise as you."

"A wise little boy, but mistaken sometimes," she said from her aching heart.

"It's nothing to die, when G.o.d loves us. Lord Vane says so. He had a little brother who died."

"A sickly child, who was never likely to live, he had been pale and ailing from a baby," spoke Lady Isabel.

"Why! Did you know him?"

"I--I heard so," she replied, turning off her thoughtless avowal in the best manner she could.

"Don't you know that I am going to die?"

"No."

"Then why have you been grieving since we left Dr. Martin's? And why do you grieve at all for me? I am not your child."

The words, the scene altogether, overcame her. She knelt down by the sofa, and her tears burst forth freely. "There! You see!" cried William.

"Oh, William, I--I had a little boy of my own, and when I look at you, I think of him, and that is why I cry."

"I know. You have told us of him before. His name was William, too."

She leaned over him, her breath mingling with his; she took his little hand in hers; "William, do you know that those whom G.o.d loves best He takes first? Were you to die, you would go to Heaven, leaving all the cares and sorrows of the world behind you. It would have been happier for many of us had we died in infancy."

"Would it have been happier for you?"

"Yes," she faintly said. "I have had more than my share of sorrow.

Sometimes I think that I cannot support it."

"Is it not past, then? Do you have sorrow now?"

"I have it always. I shall have it till I die. Had I died a child, William, I should have escaped it. Oh! The world is full of it! full and full."

"What sort of sorrow?"

"All sorts. Pain, sickness, care, trouble, sin, remorse, weariness," she wailed out. "I cannot enumerate the half that the world brings upon us.

When you are very, very tired, William, does it not seem a luxury, a sweet happiness, to lie down at night in your little bed, waiting for the bliss of sleep?"

"Yes. And I am often tired; so tired as that."

"Then just so do we, who are tired of the world's cares, long for the grave in which we shall lie down to rest. We covet it, William; long for it; but you cannot understand that."

"We don't lie in the grave, Madame Vine."

"No, no, child. Our bodies lie there, to be raised again in beauty at the last day. We go into a blessed place of rest, where sorrow and pain cannot come. I wish--I wish," she uttered, with a bursting heart, "that you and I were both there!"

"Who says the world's so sorrowful, Madame Vine? I think it is lovely, especially when the sun's shining on a hot day, and the b.u.t.terflies come out. You should see East Lynne on a summer's morning, when you are running up and down the slopes, and the trees are waving overhead, and the sky's blue, and the roses and flowers are all out. You would not call it a sad world."

"A pleasant world one might regret to leave if we were not wearied by pain and care. But, what is this world, take it at its best, in comparison with that other world, Heaven? I have heard of some people who are afraid of death; they fear they shall not go to it; but when G.o.d takes a little child there it is because He loves him. It is a land, as Mrs. Barbauld says, where the roses are without thorns, where the flowers are not mixed with brambles--"

"I have seen the flowers," interrupted William, rising in his earnestness. "They are ten times brighter than our flowers here."

"Seen the flowers! The flowers we shall see in Heaven?" she echoed.

"I have seen a picture of them. We went to Lynneborough to see Martin's picture of the Last Judgment--I don't mean Dr. Martin," said William interrupting himself.

"I know."

"There were three pictures. One was called the 'Plains of Heaven,' and I liked that best; and so we all did. Oh, you should have seen it! Did you ever see them, Madame Vine?"

"No. I have heard of them."

"There was a river, you know, and boats, beautiful gondolas they looked, taking the redeemed to the sh.o.r.es of Heaven. They were shadowy figures in white robes, myriads of them, for they reached all up in the air to the holy city; it seemed to be in the clouds coming down from G.o.d. The flowers grew on the banks of the river, pink, and blue, and violet, all colors they were, but so bright and beautiful; brighter than our flowers are."

"Who took you to see the pictures?"

"Papa. He took me and Lucy; and Mrs. Hare went with us, and Barbara--she was not our mamma then. But, madame"--dropping his voice--"what stupid thing do you think Lucy asked papa?"

"What did she ask him?"

"She asked whether mamma was amongst that crowd in the white robes; whether she was gone up to Heaven? Our mamma that was, you know, and lots of people could hear what she said."

Lady Isabel dropped her face upon her hands.