The Shadow of Ashlydyat Part 139

"That's not mamma," she said, bursting into tears.

George sat down on a chair close by, and laid her wet cheek against his, and hid his eyes amidst her curls. His emotion had spent itself in the long night, and he thought he could control it now.

"That is mamma, Meta; your mother and my dear wife. It is all that is left of her. Oh, Meta! if we had only known earlier that she was going to die!"

"It does not look like mamma."

"The moment death comes, the change begins. It has begun in mamma. Do you understand me, Meta? In a few days I shall hear read over her by your grandpapa----" George stopped: it suddenly occurred to him that the Reverend Mr. Hastings would not officiate this time; and he amended his sentence. "I shall hear read over her the words she has I know often read to you; how the corruptible body must die, and be buried in the earth as a grain of wheat is, ere it can be changed and put on immortality."

"Will she never come again?" sobbed Meta.

"Never here, never again. We shall go to her."

Meta sobbed on. "I want mamma! I want mamma, who talked to me and nursed me. Mamma loved us."

"Yes, she loved us," he said, his heart wrung with the recollection of the past: "we shall never find any one else to love us as she loved.

Meta, child, listen! Mamma lives still; she is looking down from heaven now, and sees and hears us; she loves us, and will love us for ever. And when our turn shall come to die, I hope--I hope--we shall have learnt all that she has learnt, so that G.o.d may take us to her."

It was of no use prolonging the scene: George still questioned his judgment in allowing Meta to enter upon it. But as he rose to carry her away, the child turned her head with a sharp eager motion to take a last look. A last look at the still form, the dead face of her who yesterday only had been as they were.

Margery had that instant come in, and was standing in her bonnet in the sitting-room. To describe her face of surprised consternation when she saw Meta carried out of the chamber, would take time and trouble. "You can dress her, Margery," George said, giving the child into her arms.

But for his subdued tones, and the evident emotion which lay upon him all too palpably in spite of his efforts to suppress it, Margery might have given her private opinion of the existing state of things. As it was, she confined her anger to dumb-show. Jerking Meta to her, with a half fond, half fierce gesture, she lifted her hand in dismay at sight of the naked feet, turned her own gown up, and flung it over them.

CHAPTER VIII.

A SAD PARTING.

Again another funeral in All Souls' Church, another opening of the vault of the G.o.dolphins! But it was not All Souls' Rector to officiate this time; he stood at the grave with George. Isaac Hastings had come down from London, Harry had come from his tutors.h.i.+p; Lord Averil was again there, and Mr. Crosse had asked to attend. Prior's Ash looked out on the funeral with regretful eyes, saying one to another, what a sad thing it was for her, only twenty-eight, to die.

George G.o.dolphin, contriving to maintain an outward calmness, turned away when it was over. Not yet to the mourning-coach that waited for him, but through the little gate leading to the Rectory. He was about to leave Prior's Ash for good that night, and common courtesy demanded that he should say a word of farewell to Mrs. Hastings.

In the darkened drawing-room with Grace and Rose, in their new mourning attire, sat Mrs. Hastings: George G.o.dolphin half started back as they rose to greet him. He did not stay to sit: he stood by the fireplace, his hat in his hand, its flowing c.r.a.pe almost touching the ground.

"I will say good-bye to you, now, Mrs. Hastings."

"You really leave to-night?"

"By the seven o'clock train. Will you permit me to express my hope that a brighter time may yet dawn for you; to a.s.sure you that no effort on my part shall be spared to conduce to it?"

He spoke in a low, quiet, meaning tone, and he held her hand between his. Mrs. Hastings could not misunderstand him--that he was hinting at a hope of reimbursing somewhat of their pecuniary loss.

"Thank you for your good wishes," she said, keeping down the tears. "You will allow me--you will speak to Lady Averil to allow me to have the child here for a day sometimes?"

"Need you ask it?" he answered, a generous warmth in his tone. "Cecil, I am quite sure, recognizes your right in the child at least in an equal degree with her own, and is glad to recognize it. Fare you well; fare you well, dear Mrs. Hastings."

He went out, shaking hands with Grace and Rose as he pa.s.sed, thinking how much he had always liked Mrs. Hastings, with her courteous manners and gentle voice, so like those of his lost wife. The Rector met him in the pa.s.sage, and George held out his hand.

"I shall not see you again, sir. I leave to-night."

The Rector took the hand. "I wish you a safe voyage!" he said. "I hope things will be more prosperous with you in India than they have been latterly here!"

"We have all need to wish that," was George's answer. "Mr. Hastings, promises from me might be regarded as valueless, but this much I wish to say ere we part: that I carry the weight of my debt to you about me, and I will lessen it should it be in my power. You will"--dropping his voice--"you will see that the inscription is properly placed on the tombstone?"

"I will. Have you given orders for it?"

"Oh yes. Farewell, sir. Farewell, Harry," he added, as the two sons came in. "Isaac, I shall see you in London."

He pa.s.sed swiftly out to the mourning-coach, and was driven home. Above everything on earth, George hated this leave-taking: but there were two or three to whom it had to be spoken.

Not until dusk did he go up to Ashlydyat. He called in at Lady G.o.dolphin's Folly as he pa.s.sed it: she was his father's widow, and Bessy was there. My lady was very cool. My lady told him that it was his place to give the refusal of Meta to her: and she should never forgive the slight. From the very moment she heard that Maria's life was in danger, she made up her mind to break through her rules of keeping children at a distance, and to take the child. She should have reared her in every luxury as Miss G.o.dolphin of Ashlydyat, and have left her a handsome fortune: as it was, she washed her hands of her. George thanked her for her good intention as a matter of course; but his heart leaped within him at the thought that Meta was safe and secure with Cecil: he would have taken her and Margery out to make acquaintance with the elephants, rather than have left Meta to Lady G.o.dolphin.

"She'll get over the smart, George," whispered Bessy, as she came out to bid him G.o.d-speed. "I shall be having the child here sometimes, you know. My lady's all talk: she never cherishes resentment long."

He entered the old home, Ashlydyat, and was left alone with Meta at his own request. She was in the deepest black: c.r.a.pe tucks on her short frock; not a bit of white to be seen about her, except her socks and the tips of her drawers; and Cecil had bought her a jet necklace of round beads, with a little black cross hanging from it on her neck. George sat down and took her on his knee. What with the drawn blinds and the growing twilight, the room was almost dark, and he had to look closely at the little face turned to him. She was very quiet, rather pale, as if she had grieved a good deal in the last few days.

"Meta," he began, and then he stopped to clear his husky voice--"Meta, I am going away."

She made no answer. She buried her face upon him and began to cry softly. It was no news to her, for Cecil had talked to her the previous night. But she clasped her arms tightly round him as if she could not let him go, and began to tremble.

"Meta!--my child!"

"I want mamma!" burst from the little full heart. "I want mamma to be with me again. Is she gone away for ever? Is she put down in the grave with Uncle Thomas? Oh, papa! I want to see her!"

A moment's struggle with himself, and then George G.o.dolphin gave way to the emotion which he had so successfully restrained in the churchyard.

They sobbed together, the father and child: her face against his, the sobs bursting freely from his bosom. He let them come; loud, pa.s.sionate, bitter sobs; unchecked, unsubdued. Do not despise him for it! they are not the worst men who can thus give way to the vehemence of our common nature.

It spent itself after a time; such emotion must spend itself; but it could not wholly pa.s.s yet. Meta was the first to speak: the same vain wish breaking from her, the sane cry.

"I want mamma! Why did she go away for ever?"

"Not for ever, Meta. Only for a time. Oh, child, we shall go to her: we shall go to her in a little while. Mamma's gone to be an angel; to keep a place for us in heaven."

"How long will it be?"

"Not a moment of our lives but it will draw nearer and nearer. Meta, it may be well for us that those we love should go on first, or we might never care to go thither ourselves."

She lay more quietly. George laid his hand upon her head, unconsciously playing with her golden hair, his tears dropping on it.

"You must think of mamma always, Meta. Think that she is looking down at you, on all you do, and try and please her. She was very good: and you must be good, making ready to go to her."

A renewed burst of sobs came from the child. George waited, and then resumed.

"When I come back--if I live to come back; or when you come to me in India; at any rate when I see you again, Meta, you will probably be grown up; no longer a child, but a young lady. If I shall only find you like mamma was in all things, I shall be happy. Do you understand, darling?"