Part 96 (1/2)
The colour comes and goes in her ashy face, and she sinks into a chair, faint and giddy beneath the shock. He is safe, and she will see him again. But then flashes in the thought of that other barrier--Truscott and his fatal knowledge. Was it not in this man's power to part them again? Ah, surely not. Whatever dreadful mystery there is, she feels sure somehow that it will be cleared up. She will see him again--her one heart's love--whom she sent forth to a cruel death. She will explain all, and he will forgive her--though it is the second time she has driven him from her--yes, she knows that, even if that last hurried note, which he had sent back to her on the eve of his awful peril, and which is now all blurred from the tears which have rained upon it--that last precious relic--had not been what it was.
And Annie Payne, entering at this moment--having the while been at the back of the house, where she could neither see nor hear the telegraph boy--started and stared in amazement, for Lilian broke into a radiant smile as she held out the despatch, and then burst into a flood of happy, grateful tears.
”There, Lilian darling. Didn't I tell you while there was life there was hope? And now you'll see that everything will come right,” said her warm-hearted friend, going over to kiss her. And then out of sheer sympathy, she began to cry, too.
”Please, missis,” said the Hottentot servant-girl, bursting into the room in great trepidation, ”there's a lady at the gate who's very ill.
She seems hardly able to stand.”
”Goodness gracious!” cried kind-hearted Annie Payne. ”Who can she be?
We must get her in--Come, Lilian!”
The sun beat fiercely down into the wide dusty street, which was silent and deserted in the broiling forenoon. Not a soul was visible, save one. Leaning unsteadily against the garden railings, as if for support, stood a figure clothed in black conventual garb.
”Why, Lilian, it's a nun,” whispered Annie Payne. Then aloud, as they reached the stranger's side: ”Now, do please come in at once and have a good long rest, and a gla.s.s of wine. The heat has been too much for you. Here, take my arm. No, don't try and talk yet.”
The nun looked up with a faint smile, at the kindly, impulsive tones.
”You are very good,” she began, speaking with a foreign accent. ”The sun is so hot, but I shall soon be better.”
”Of course you will,” was the cheery reply; and in a moment the sufferer found herself on a comfortable sofa in a cool, half-darkened room, so refres.h.i.+ng after the glare of the street, while her hostess and Lilian set to work to administer restoratives.
Their charge was a striking-looking woman, still quite young. Of foreign aspect, her face, though deathly pale, was very handsome, and lighted by a pair of large dark eyes. An uncommon face withal, and one which interested her entertainers keenly.
”Who is she, Lilian?” whispered Annie Payne, hurriedly beckoning the other from the room. ”Roman Catholic, or one of your High Church Sisters? You know all about that sort of thing.”
”She must be from the convent. There are no Anglican Sisters here.
Besides, she's foreign, evidently.”
They returned to the nun, who, professing herself quite restored by her short rest, declared she must return home.
”Not to be thought of, for some hours at least,” replied her hostess, decisively. ”You have narrowly escaped a sunstroke as it is. I'll send round to the convent immediately, and let them know you're here, and that I'm not going to allow you to move before the evening. At least, I'll go myself, that'll be better than sending. Lilian, take her to your room, it's quieter there, and away from the children's noise, and make her lie down for at least three hours. By the way, I was nearly forgetting. Who shall I say?”
”I am known as Sister Cecilia. G.o.d will bless you for your kindness to me, and--”
”There, there, you are not well enough to talk,” interrupted Annie, with good-humoured brusqueness, as she hurried away to prepare for her errand.
Of a certainty the sufferer could have been left in no better hands, and just then such a work of mercy was doubly grateful to Lilian, whose own hopes had been so miraculously fulfilled. Her charge having sunk into a deep, refres.h.i.+ng sleep, Lilian moved noiselessly to a seat in the window, and there, with her eyes fixed upon the outside world, she let her busy thoughts have free scope. Something in the stillness of the day took her memory back to that fatal afternoon when Truscott had come in and dashed the cup of happiness from her lips. She remembered the terrible shock the discovery of his reappearance had been, and then the ruthless manner in which he had seared her heartstrings as with a red-hot iron, and a reaction overtook her. If there was anything in his knowledge, why, his terrible threats were all-powerful for evil still.
Yet her lover's life was safe for the present. He had been s.n.a.t.c.hed almost miraculously from the cruel hands of his savage enemies. Let her be thankful for that, at any rate. Perhaps Heaven might be even yet more merciful to her--to them both--and the other dark mystery might be cleared up. Ah, that only it would!
For a couple of hours her reverie had run on, when a sudden e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n and a few words, muttered hurriedly in a foreign language sounding like Spanish or Italian, recalled her.
”Are you feeling better, Sister?” she began, softly, rising at once, and going over to her charge.
The latter hardly seemed to hear. With gaze set and rigid, her attention was fixed on something opposite the bed, and Lilian noticed that her lips were livid and trembling.
”Who is that?” she gasped. ”Am I dreaming? What is he--to you?”
Lilian's face flushed softly, as she followed the other's glance. It was riveted on two lifelike cabinet portraits of her lover, which stood framed upon the table.
”What is Lidwell to you?” went on the sufferer, half raising herself, while her burning eyes sought Lilian's with a feverish glow. ”Ah, I see--I need not ask. But where is he? Here? _No_--not here!”