“Loves me!” she exclaimed.

“Loves you,” repeated Mave, “is the word, an I have said it.”

“I didn’t suspect that when I spoke,” she replied.

Each looked upon the other, and both as they stood were as pale as death itself.  At length Mave spoke.

“I have only one thought, Sarah, an’ that is how to make him happy; to see him happy.”

“I can scarcely spake,” replied Sarah; “I wouldn’t know what to say if I did.  I’m all confused; Mave, dear, forgive me!”

“God bless you,” replied Mave, “for you are truth an’ honesty itself.  God bless an’ you, make him happy!  Good-bye, dear Sarah.”

She put her hand into Sarah’s and felt that it trembled excessively—­but Sarah was utterly passive; she did not even return the pressure which she had received, and when Mave departed, she was standing in a reverie, incapable of thought, deadly pale, and perfectly motionless.

CHAPTEE XXV. —­ Sarah Without Hope.

How Sarah returned to Dalton’s cabin she herself knew not.  Such was the tumult which the communication then made to her by Mave, had occasioned in her mind, that, the scene which had just taken place, altogether appeared to her excited spirit like a troubled dream, whose impressions were too unreal and deceptive to be depended on for a moment.  The reaction from the passive state in which Mave had left her, was, to a temperament like her’s, perfectly overwhelming.  Her pulse beat high, her cheek burned, and her eye flashed with more than its usual fire and overpowering brilliancy, and, with the exception of one impression alone, all her thoughts were so rapid and indistinct as to resemble the careering clouds which fly in tumult and confusion along the troubled sky, with nothing stationary but the sun far above, and which, in this case, might be said to resemble the bright conviction of Dalton’s love for her, that Mave’s assurance had left behind it.  On re-entering the cabin, without being properly conscious of what she either did or said, she once more knelt by the side of Dalton’s bed, and hastily taking his unresisting hand, was about to speak; but a difficulty how to shape her language held her in a painful and troubled suspense for some moments, during which Dalton could plainly perceive the excitement, or rather rapture, by which she was actuated.  At length a gush of hot and burning tears enabled her to speak, and she said: 

“Con Dalton—­dear Con, is it true? can it be true?—­oh, no—­no—­but, then, she says it—­is it true that you like me—­like me!—­no, no—­that word is too wake—­is it true that you love me? but no—­it can’t be—­there never was so much happiness intended for me; and then, if it should be true—­oh, if it was possible, how will I bear it? what will I do? what—­is to be the consequence? for my love for you is beyond all belief—­beyond all that tongue can tell.  I can’t stand this struggle—­my head is giddy—­I scarcely know what I’m sayin’, or is it a dhrame that I’ll waken from, and find it false—­false?”