Phillis too—­he screamed whenever he saw her, and with a jealousy not unnatural, and which Mrs. Grey was rather sorry for than annoyed at, she came into the room continually.  At last it became a question almost of life and death, for the fever ran high; and even Dr. Anstruther, cheery man as he was, began to look exceedingly grave.  The child must be kept quiet, and how to do it?

For in this crisis Christian found out, what every woman has to find out soon or late, the weak points in her husband.  She saw that, like many another good and brave man, he was in this matter quite paralyzed; that she could rely only upon herself, and act for herself, or else tell him what he was to do, and help him to do it, just like a child.  She did not care for him the less for this—­she sometimes felt she cared for him, more; but she opened her eyes calmly to the facts of the case, and to her own heavy responsibility.

She consulted with Dr. Anstruther, and left him to explain things to whomsoever he would; then locked the door, and for eight days and nights suffered no one to cross the threshold of Arthur’s room except the doctor.

It was a daring expedient, but the desperation of the time and Dr. Anstruther’s consent and co-operation, gave her courage; she was neither timid nor ignorant; she knew exactly what to do, and she believed, if it were God’s will to save Arthur’s life, He would give her strength to do it.

“My boy’s life—­only his life!” she prayed, more earnestly than she had ever prayed in her life before, and then prepared for the long solitary vigil, of which it was impossible to foresee the end.  In its terrible suspense she forgot every thing except the present; day by day and hour by hour, as they slipped heavily along.  She ceased to think of herself at all, scarcely even of her husband; her mind was wholly engrossed by her poor sick boy.

Hers, though hitherto she had never loved him; for he was not lovable at all, that rough, selfish, headstrong Arthur, the plague of his aunts, and the terror of the nursery.  But now, when he lay on his sick-bed, lingering on from day to day, in total dependence on her care, with a heavy future before him, poor child!—­for he seemed seriously injured—­ there came into his step-mother’s weak, womanly heart a woman’s passionate tenderness over all helpless things.  She did to him not only her duty, but something more.  She learned to love him.

Had any one told her a while ago that she should stand for hours watching every change in that pale face, whose common, uncomely features grew spiritualized with sickness, till she often trembled on their unearthly sweetness; that twenty times in the night she would start up from her uncomfortable sofa-bed, listening for the slightest sound; that the sight of Arthur eating his dinner (often prepared by her own hands, for the servants of the Lodge were strangely neglectful), or of Arthur trying to play a game of draughts, and faintly smiling over it, should cause her a perfect ecstasy of delight, Christian would have replied “Impossible!” But heaven sometimes converts our impossibles and inevitables into the very best blessings we have—­most right, most natural, and most dear.