Then Robert spoke to the farmer.

Rhoda could hear Robert’s words.  Her fear was that Dahlia might hear them too, his pleading for Edward was so hearty.  “Yet why should I always think differently from Robert?” she asked herself, and with that excuse for changeing, partially thawed.

She was very anxious for her father’s reply; and it was late in coming.  She felt that he was unconvinced.  But suddenly the door opened, and the farmer called into the darkness,—­

“Dahlia down here!”

Previously emotionless, an emotion was started in Rhoda’s bosom by the command, and it was gladness.  She ran up and knocked, and found herself crying out:  “He is here—­Edward.”

But there came no answer.

“Edward is here.  Come, come and see him.”

Still not one faint reply.

“Dahlia!  Dahlia!”

The call of Dahlia’s name seemed to travel endlessly on.  Rhoda knelt, and putting her mouth to the door, said,—­

“My darling, I know you will reply to me.  I know you do not doubt me now.  Listen.  You are to come down to happiness.”

The silence grew heavier; and now a doubt came shrieking through her soul.

“Father!” rang her outcry.

The father came; and then the lover came, and neither to father nor to lover was there any word from Dahlia’s voice.

She was found by the side of the bed, inanimate, and pale as a sister of death.

But you who may have cared for her through her many tribulations, have no fear for this gentle heart.  It was near the worst; yet not the worst.

CHAPTER XLVII

Up to the black gates, but not beyond them.  The dawn following such a night will seem more like a daughter of the night than promise of day.  It is day that follows, notwithstanding:  The sad fair girl survived, and her flickering life was the sole light of the household; at times burying its members in dusk, to shine on them again more like a prolonged farewell than a gladsome restoration.

She was saved by what we call chance; for it had not been in her design to save herself.  The hand was firm to help her to the deadly draught.  As far as could be conjectured, she had drunk it between hurried readings from her mother’s Bible; the one true companion to which she had often clung, always half-availingly.  The Bible was found by her side, as if it had fallen from the chair before which she knelt to read her last quickening verses, and had fallen with her.  One arm was about it; one grasped the broken phial with its hideous label.