Lover or Friend Part 86

'I do not know,' he returned with a shudder; 'I would not answer for myself: it was such an awful death!'

'But I can answer for you,' she replied calmly: 'you would have done it if he had not been beforehand.'

And then she moved away from him, and began to arrange the few flowers that the people of the house had sent up to her.

Michael waited until she had finished. She was exhausted and weary, he knew, and he was anxious to take her to South Audley Street, where her mother would be awaiting them. Michael had telegraphed to her earlier in the day, and the answer had come that she was already on her way.

Audrey made an attempt to see Mrs. Blake before she left, but Biddy would not admit her.

'It will drive my mistress crazy to see anyone,' she said. 'She has quieted down a bit, and the doctor has given me some stuff to make her sleep; and his orders were that I was to keep her as still as possible.'

And after this Audrey dared not persist.

But it grieved her to leave poor Mollie in that desolate house, the girl seemed so utterly alone; but Michael said he had spoken to the woman of the house, and that she had promised to look after her.

'We ought not to take her with us, dear Audrey,' he said gently, but firmly; 'it is her duty to stay with her mother.' And Audrey acquiesced a little reluctantly.

Mrs. Ross cried abundantly as she took Audrey in her arms; her motherly soul was filled with pity for her girl. But Audrey had no more tears to shed.

'Mother,' she said pleadingly, when, after the late evening meal, Michael had retired and left them alone together--'mother, I must wear mourning for Cyril. I hope father will not mind.'

'You shall do as you like, my love,' returned her mother sadly. 'Your father will not object to anything you wish to do. You know we all loved dear Cyril.'

'Yes, mother; and you were always so good to him. Towards the last he mentioned you and father: "Give my love to them both." Michael heard him say it.'

'Geraldine is as unhappy as possible. She drove with me to the station.

She begged me over and over again to say how grieved she was for you.'

'Poor dear Gage is always so kind!' replied Audrey calmly. 'Mother dear, should you mind my going to bed now? My head aches so, and I am so tired!'

Then Mrs. Ross attended her daughter to her room, and did not leave her until her weary head was on the pillow.

'I should like to stay,' she said, looking at her child with yearning eyes; 'but I suppose you would rather be alone.'

'Yes, mother dear;' and then she drew her mother's face down to hers and kissed it tenderly. 'Dearest, you are so good to me, and so is Michael.'

'Who could help being good to you, Audrey?'

'Yes; but you must not be too kind to me. One must not let one's unhappiness spoil other people's lives. I want to be as brave as he was.

Will you draw up the blind, mother dear? It is such a beautiful moonlight night.' And, as Mrs. Ross did as she was asked, Audrey raised herself upon her elbow. 'Oh, how calm and lovely it looks! Even the housetops are transfigured and glorified. Oh, mother, it is all as it should be! Cyril said so; and he is safe in his Father's house--in his Father's and mine!' she half whispered to herself, as she sank back on the pillow again.

CHAPTER XLVII

A STRANGE EXPIATION

'When some beloved voice that was to you Both sound and sweetness faileth suddenly, And silence against which you dare not cry Aches round you like a strong disease and new, What hope? what help?...

...Nay, none of these.

Speak, Thou availing Christ! and fill this pause.'

MRS. BROWNING.

Mrs. Ross soon discovered that Audrey wished to remain in town until the funeral was over, and she at once wrote off to her husband for the required permission.

Dr. Ross made no objection; he meant to be present himself at the funeral, and as he had some important business that would detain him another day or so in London, he suggested that they should accompany him back to Woodcote.

Audrey seemed satisfied when she had read her father's letter. He had sent her a message that touched her greatly.

'I hope our child will not grieve over-much,' he wrote. 'Tell her that her father sympathises with her most fully. By and by she will read the meaning of this painful lesson. As for poor Cyril, one can only long to change places with him. His was a short and fiery trial, but at least he was spared the burden and heat of the day. When one thinks of his blameless youth, and the manly endurance with which he met and faced his trouble, one can only be thankful that he has been taken out of a life that would have been only one long struggle and disappointment, and has entered so early into his rest.'

'Father is right,' murmured Audrey, as she read this. 'Every morning I wake I thank G.o.d that he has ceased to suffer.'

Audrey went every day to see Mollie, and to spend a few minutes by Cyril's coffin. She went with Michael to Highgate to choose his last resting-place, and no other hands but hers arranged the flowers that decked the chamber of death. Mrs. Blake remained in her own room, and refused to see anyone. Biddy's account of her mistress was very unsatisfactory.

'She does not sleep unless I give her the doctor's soothing stuff,' she confessed one day, when Audrey questioned her very closely, 'and sometimes I cannot coax her to take it. "I don't want to sleep, Biddy,"

that is all her cry. "If I sleep I must wake, and the waking is too terrible." Unless Blessed Mary and the saints help my mistress,'

continued Biddy, wiping the tears from her withered cheeks, 'I think she will go out of her mind. She spends half the night in that room. Early this morning I missed her, and found her lying in a dead faint beside the coffin. She does not eat, and I never see her shed a tear. She sits rocking herself and moaning as though she were in pain, and then she starts up and walks the room till it turns one giddy to see her. I dare not leave her a moment. If she would only see a doctor! but, poor soul, she will do nothing now to please her old Biddy.'

'I must see her,' exclaimed Audrey, horrified at this description of wild, unchastened grief. 'Biddy, will you take this note to her?' and Biddy, nothing loath, carried off the slip of paper.

Audrey had only pencilled a few words:

'My poor friend, let me come to you; ours is the same sorrow. For Cyril's sake, do not refuse me.'

But Biddy came back the next moment shaking her head very sorrowfully.

'I can do nought with her,' she said hastily. 'She sends her love, Miss Ross, but she will see no one--no one. I have done the best I can for you, but I dare not anger her,' finished the old woman, moving sadly away. 'Why, she has not seen Master Kester, though he came to her door last night! We must leave her alone until she comes round to her right mind.'

'Do you think she will be at the funeral?' Michael asked more than once; but no one was able to answer this question.

But when the day came she was there, closely veiled, so that no one could see her face, and as she walked to the grave, between Kester and Mollie, her step seemed as firm as ever. Michael had written to Matthew O'Brien the particulars of his son's death, and had told him that a place would be reserved for him among the mourners; but to this there was no reply.

Just as the service began in the chapel, however, a tall man with a gray moustache slipped into the seat behind Kester. When the sad procession filed out into the cemetery, Audrey and Michael drew back to let him pa.s.s, but he made signs for them to precede him. But at the end, as they all crowded round the open grave to take their last look at the flower-decked coffin, Mat O'Brien stood for a moment by his wife's side.

Audrey said afterwards that she was sure Mrs. Blake saw him; she started slightly, but took no further notice. The tears were streaming down Mat's face, and Mollie, with girlish sympathy, had slipped her hand through his arm; but the mother stood in stony impa.s.siveness beside them, until Kester whispered something to her and led her away. The rest of the mourners had dispersed, but Audrey stood there still, looking thoughtfully down into the grave. Dr. Ross and his wife had followed the others, but Michael had kept his place beside Audrey.

'I think they are waiting for us, dear,' he said at last, as though to rouse her.

Then she turned her face to him.

'I like being here,' she replied simply; 'and yet it is not pain to leave him lying there. Michael, I feel like Christian. Do you remember how his burden rolled off into an open grave? Somehow, mine has rolled off, too.'

'You mean that you are happy about him.'

'Yes. It is so sweet to think that he will never suffer any more. Oh, Michael, it has been such a burden! I never seemed to have a moment's peace or comfort. Every night I used to think, "How has he pa.s.sed to-day? Has it been very bad with him?" And sometimes the thought of all he was bearing seemed to weigh me to the earth.'

'And you never spoke of this to anyone--you bore all this by yourself?'