“I cannot see your face,” she said.  “Where is the light?”

The face disappeared, and immediately, through the curtains, the mother saw the light.  But still she could not see the girl’s face.  She said so peevishly.

“It will weary your eyes.  Lie still, mother, and go to sleep again.”

“What time is it?”

“I do not know.”

“Are you not in bed?”

“Not yet, mother.”

The sick woman moaned again once or twice, but thought no more of it.  And presently the deep sleep of sickness came down on her again.

* * * * *

They rose early in those days in England; and soon after six o’clock, as Janet had seen nothing of her young mistress, she opened the door of the sleeping-room and peeped in....  A minute later Marjorie’s mind rose up out of black gulfs of sleep, in which, since her falling asleep an hour or two ago, she had wandered, bearing an intolerable burden, which she could neither see nor let fall, to find the rosy-streaked face of Janet, all pinched with cold, peering into her own.  She sat up, wide awake, yet with all her world still swaying about her, and stared into her maid’s eyes.

“What is it?  What time is it?”

“It is after six, mistress.  And the mistress seems uneasy.  I—­”

Marjorie sprang up and went to the bed.

III

On the evening of that day her mother died.

* * * * *

There was no priest within reach.  A couple of men had ridden out early, dispatched by Marjorie within half an hour of her awaking—­to Dethick, to Hathersage, and to every spot within twenty miles where a priest might be found, with orders not to return without one.  But the long day had dragged out:  and when dusk was falling, still neither had come back.  The country was rain-soaked and all but impassable, she learned later, across valley after valley, where the streams had risen.  And nowhere could news be gained that any priest was near; for, as a further difficulty, open inquiry was not always possible, in view of the news that had come to Booth’s Edge last night.  The girl had understood that the embers were rising again to flame in the south; and who could tell but that a careless word might kindle the fire here, too.  She had been urged by Anthony to hold herself more careful than ever, and she had been compelled to warn her messengers.

* * * * *

It was soon after dusk had fallen—­the heavy dusk of a December day—­that her mother had come back again to consciousness.  She opened her eyes wearily, coming back, as Marjorie had herself that morning, from that strange realm of heavy and deathly sleep, to the pale phantom world called “life”; and agonising pain about the heart stabbed her wide awake.

“O Jesu!” she screamed.

Then she heard her daughter’s voice, very steady and plain, in her ear.