Throughout the short winter day, which seemed terribly long in the stillness and solitude of Great Langdale, Lady Maulevrier kept watch in the sick-room, Steadman going in and out in constant attendance upon his master—­save for one half-hour only, which her ladyship passed in the parlour below, in conversation with the landlady, a very serious conversation, as indicated by Mrs. Smithson’s grave and somewhat troubled looks when she left her ladyship; but a good deal of her trouble may have been caused by her anxiety about her brother, who was pronounced by the doctor to be ‘much the same.’

At eleven o’clock that night a mounted messenger was sent off to Ambleside in hot haste to fetch Mr. Evans, who came to the inn to find Lady Maulevrier kneeling beside her husband’s bed, while Steadman stood with a troubled countenance at a respectful distance.

The room was dimly lighted by a pair of candles burning on a table near the window, and at some distance from the old four-post bedstead, shaded by dark moreen curtains.  The surgeon looked round the room, and then fumbled in his pockets for his spectacles, without the aid of which the outside world presented itself to him under a blurred and uncertain aspect.

He put on his spectacles, and moved towards the bed; but the first glance in that direction showed him what had happened.  The outline of the rigid figure under the coverlet looked like a sculptured effigy upon a tomb.  A sheet was drawn over the face of death.

‘You are too late to be of any use, Mr. Evans,’ murmured Steadman, laying his hand upon the doctor’s sleeve and drawing him away towards the door.

They went softly on to the landing, off which opened the door of that other sick-room where the landlady’s brother was lying.

‘When did this happen?’

‘A quarter of an hour after the messenger rode off to fetch you,’ answered Steadman.  ’His lordship lay all the afternoon in a heavy sleep, and we thought he was going on well; but after dark there was a difficulty in his breathing which alarmed her ladyship, and she insisted upon you being sent for.  The messenger had hardly been gone a quarter of an hour when his lordship woke suddenly, muttured to himself in a curious way, gave just one long drawn sigh, and—­and all was over.  It was a terrible shock for her ladyship.’

‘Indeed it must have been,’ murmured the village doctor.  ’It is a great surprise to me.  I knew Lord Maulevrier was low, very low, the pulse feeble and intermittent; but I had no fear of anything of this kind.  It is very sudden.’

‘Yes, it is awfully sudden,’ said Steadman, and then he murmured in the doctor’s ear, ’You will give the necessary certificate, I hope, with as little trouble to her ladyship as possible.  This is a dreadful blow, and she——­’

’She shall not be troubled.  The body will be removed to-morrow, I suppose.’

’Yes.  He must be buried from his own house.  I sent a second messenger to Ambleside for the undertaker.  He will be here very soon, no doubt, and if the shell is ready by noon to-morrow, the body can be removed then.  I have arranged to get her ladyship away to-night.’