“’But, my darling heart, she’s unconscious.  She has never been conscious all day.  She would not know you!’

“I sank stunned upon the stair.  Some one touched my shoulder: 

“’You had better go to bed, it is past one.  No, you can’t sleep here:  there’s no bed.  You must lie down; a sofa won’t do, you are too ill.  Very well, then, you are not ill, but you will be to-morrow if you don’t go to bed.’

“I found myself in the street, Arthur Balfour holding one of my arms and Spencer Lyttelton the other.  They took me to 40 Grosvenor Square.  I went to bed and early next morning I went across to Upper Brook Street.  The servant looked happy: 

“‘She’s better, miss, and she’s conscious.’

“I flew upstairs, and Charty met me in her dressing-gown.  She was calm and capable as always, but a new look, less questioning and more intense, had come into her face.  She said: 

“‘You can go in now.’

“I felt a rushing of my soul and an over-eagerness that half-stopped me as I opened the door and stood at the foot of the wooden bed and gazed at what was left of Laura.

“Her face had shrunk to the size of a child’s; her lashes lay a black wall on the whitest of cheeks; her hair was hanging dragged up from her square brow in heavy folds upon the pillow.  Her mouth was tightly shut and a dark blood-stain marked her chin.  After a long silence, she moved and muttered and opened her eyes.  She fixed them on me, and my heart stopped.  I stretched my hands out towards her, and said, ’Laura!’...  But the sound died; she did not know me.  I knew after that she could not live.

“People went away for the Easter Holidays:  Papa to North Berwick, Arthur Balfour to Westward Ho! and every day Godfrey Webb rode a patient cob up to the front door, to hear that she was no better.  I sat on the stairs listening to the roar of London and the clock in the library.  The doctor—­Matthews Duncan—­patted my head whenever he passed me on the stair and said, in his gentle Scotch accent: 

“‘Poor little girl!  Poor, poor little girl!’

“I was glad he did not say that ’while there was life there was hope,’ or any of the medical platitudes, or I would have replied that he lied. There was no hope—­none! ...

“One afternoon I went with Lucy to St. George’s, Hanover Square.  The old man was sweeping out the church; and we knelt and prayed.  Laura and I have often knelt side by side at that altar and I never feel alone when I am in front of the mysterious Christ-picture, with its bars of violet and bunches of grapes.

“On my return I went upstairs and lay on the floor of Laura’s bedroom, watching Alfred kneeling by her side with his arms over his head.  Charty sat with her hands clasped; a single candle behind her head transfigured her lovely hair into a halo.  Suddenly Laura opened her eyes and, turning them slowly on Charty, said: 

“‘You are heavenly! . . .’