* * * * *

Yes, Eleanor!  Dr. Penn was right.  The day did end—­and the next—­and the next; and drop by drop the cup of sorrow was drained.  And when the draught is done, should we be the better, Nelly, if it had been nectar?

I had neither died nor gone mad when the day came—­the last complete day that George was to see on earth.  It was Sunday; and, after a sleepless night, I saw the red sun break through the grey morning.  I always sleep with my window open; and, as I lay and watched the sunrise, I thought—­

“He will see this sunrise, and to-morrow’s sunrise; but no other!  No, no!—­never more!”

But then a stronger thought seemed to rise involuntarily against that one—­

“Peace, fool!  If this be the sorrow, it is one that must come to all men.”

And then, Nelly (it is strange, but it was so), there broke out in the stone pine by my window a chorus of little birds whom the sunbeams had awakened; and they sang so sweet and so loud (like the white bird that sang to the monk Felix), that earthly cares seemed to fade away, and I fell asleep, and slept the first sound, dreamless sleep that had blessed me since our great trouble came.

CHAPTER V.

BETWEEN TWO WORLDS.

Dr. Penn was with George this day, and was to be with him to the last.  His duty was taken by a curate.

I will not attempt to describe my feelings at this terrible time, but merely narrate circumstantially the wonderful events (or illusions, call them which you will) of the evening.

We sat up-stairs in the blue room, and Harriet fell asleep on the sofa.

It was about half-past ten o’clock when she awoke with a scream, and in such terror that I had much difficulty in soothing her.  She seemed very unwilling to tell me the cause of her distress; but at last confessed that on the two preceding nights she had had a vivid and alarming dream, on each night the same.  Poor Edmund’s hand (she recognized it by the sapphire ring) seemed to float in the air before her; and even after she awoke, she still seemed to see it floating towards the door, and then coming back again, till it vanished altogether.  She had seen it again now in her sleep.  I sat silent, struggling with a feeling of indignation.  Why had she not spoken of it before?  I do not know how long it might have been before I should have broken the silence, but that my eyes turned to the partially-open window and the dark night that lay beyond.  Then I shrieked, louder than she had done—­

“Harriet! There it is!”