"Don't say so. Think--think--what if he should die?" said Frances, fearfully.

"Ah! G.o.d help me!" said Amy; she could say no more. But Frances clung to her dress.

"It is I who should say, G.o.d help me!" she cried; "don't you know I took Bertie to the cottage where he caught the fever? Oh! Mrs. Vavasour, you don't know half my agony and remorse, or what I suffered when I found out what I had done."

"My boy's illness, my husband's scorn, broken hopes, and grieving heart, my crushed spirit, all--all I owe to you. May G.o.d forgive you, Miss Strickland."

"Yes, yes; G.o.d forgive me. I deny nothing. But, oh! will not you forgive me, Mrs. Vavasour? I will try, I will, indeed, to make amends."

This abject appeal from the proud Frances? But Amy scarcely heeded it.

"You cannot make amends," she said, despairingly. "It is past atonement--this great wrong you have done."

"Oh! do not be so harsh and cruel to me; your heart was soft enough once."

"It was. You have changed it, and are the first to feel its hardness. I am no longer what I was; but for my boy I should turn into a stone, or die."

"And I? What am I to do? If--if anything should happen to Bertie. Oh! I shall go mad," she cried. "Think of my grief then. I, who unwittingly gave him this fever; think what my heart would feel, what it even feels now; and be not so merciless."

"No, not half so merciless as your bad heart has been. I can give you no greater punishment than your own guilty remorse, and frightened heart. I will remain no longer, Miss Strickland. You shall not see my boy!"

And Amy left Frances weeping, perhaps the first _genuine_ repentant tears she had ever shed.

Robert sat at his boy's bed-side all that night, cooling his burning forehead and heated head with the cold wet cloth dipped in vinegar and water, or holding him up in his arms while his poor parched lips feebly yet eagerly drank from the cup his mother held so tremblingly before him, while Frances alternately walked her room despairingly, or crouched away in the dark on the stairs near, her ear vainly trying to catch the words of those mournful watchers and nurses who stepped about so softly in the sick chamber beyond.

CHAPTER XII.

A FADING FLOWER.

"The coldness from my heart is gone, But still the weight is there, And thoughts which I abhor will come, And tempt me to despair.

"Those thoughts I constantly repel; And all, methinks, might yet be well, Could I but weep once more; And with true tears of penitence My dreadful state deplore."

SOUTHEY.

The long hours of night wore away, and the morning broke, bright, fresh, and frosty. Then the long corridor and pa.s.sages echoed with the sound of hasty footsteps hurrying through them, while the quick, sudden opening and shutting of doors betokened an unusual stir in the Hall. The children were preparing for their journey.

Half an hour later all was silent and still, more so than it had been for days. The children were gone.

Again we enter the sick room. Bertie is no better, but, if anything, worse; his little face more flushed and heated, his burning hands wandering restlessly about, to and fro, as he tosses and turns upon his little cot, his anxious eyes no longer looking mournfully, and as it were imploringly in his mother's face for help from his pain, for Bertie is delirious, and does not even recognise her; his thoughts ramble, and he talks incoherently and strangely.

Mrs. Hopkins often came to see him, bringing, as was her wont, in cases of illness, broths and cooling drinks she had prepared with her own hand; but Bertie was too ill to heed them, and Amy could but look her thanks--words she had none.

It was on returning from one of these visits, with cup and saucer in hand, that she met Frances Strickland.

"Have you been to see Master Bertie?" she asked.

"Yes, Miss," replied Mrs. Hopkins, with a sigh.

"And how is he? Do you think he is any better this morning?"

"No, Miss, I don't. It's my belief he couldn't well be worse; but the doctor'll know better than me. I suppose he'll be here presently."

"What makes you think him so ill?"

"I've been the mother of four, Miss, and lost them all, and none of them looked a bit worse than Master Bertie, poor, innocent lamb."

"But you had not two doctors," returned Frances.

"No, nor half the nurses to wait on mine; but I'd the same loving, craving mother's heart and the same G.o.d to look up to and hope in," and the housekeeper pa.s.sed on, as the rebuke fell from her lips.

"Oh! I wish I could hope, I wish I could pray," cried Frances, as she went once more into the solitude of her own room; not only did she grieve for Bertie, but the terror lest through her means he should die had at last brought repentance to her unfeeling heart; she had been so wicked, so relentlessly cruel to his mother, that perhaps the boy's death was to be her punishment; and she could think of, scarcely look forward to, anything else.

Dr. Bernard stayed at the Park all that night; he whispered no decided hope to Amy's heart. There was only a very grave look on his face as after bending over Bertie and feeling the quick, sharp pulse beating so fiercely against his finger, he said, "While there is life there is hope," and Amy was obliged to content her poor heart with this, and repeat it over and over again to herself all through that long sad night; the second of Bertie's illness, and of her own and her husband's watch, for Robert scarcely ever left his boy, but remained through the weary hours of night patiently by his side; only old Hannah s.n.a.t.c.hing every now and then a moment's sleep.

Towards the morning Bertie grew more composed, the hands tossed about less restlessly, and the weary, anxious eyes closed in sleep: so calm and still he looked that Amy bent down her head to catch the faint breath.

"It is not death?" she said to Dr. Bernard, who had been hastily aroused.

"No. The crisis is past I hope. The fever has left him. It is weakness, excessive weakness," but he did not add that that was as much to be dreaded as the fever; while Amy only prayed that when he awoke he would recognise her, so long it seemed since his little lips had said "Mamma."

Just before luncheon, Anne with her husband drove up to the Hall. She was rushing into the morning-room with her usual haste and merry laugh, when she was checked by Mrs. Linchmore's grave face.

"Has anything happened, Isabella? How grave you look."

Yes a great deal had happened; she had a great deal to hear, and Anne sat herself down to listen to it all patiently--or as patiently as she could to the end. As soon as it was told, she was rushing impetuously from the room.

"Is the boy in the small red room?" she asked.

"Yes. But Anne, the fever is infectious; you had better stay away. Mrs.

Vavasour can come and see you here."

"As if she would leave him?" she cried, "not a bit of it, I know her better, besides I am not afraid of anything. I shall go." Anne was right, there was very little indeed she was afraid of.

"But Anne, think of your husband; he might not like it."

"Ah! true; how tiresome it is sometimes to have a husband! I suppose I shall have to wait a whole hour before he thinks of coming back."

"Did he drive in with you?"

"Yes, and has gone on in the pony carriage to call at the Rectory. Isn't it provoking. I have a great mind not to wait for him."

"It might have been a great deal worse; suppose he had not driven in with you?"

"Then I should have braved his anger and been at the boy's bed-side long ago," and she walked to the window, and strained her eyes impatiently down the drive.