Then Sylvia sate up, and put back her hair, bewildered and uncertain as to what was to be done next; how she should meet the husband to whom she had discarded all allegiance, repudiated the solemn promise of love and obedience which she had vowed.

Phoebe came into the room, with natural interest in the invalid, scarcely older than herself.

‘How is t’ old lady?’ asked she, in a low voice.

Sylvia turned her head round to look; her mother had never moved, but was breathing in a loud uncomfortable manner, that made her stoop over her to see the averted face more nearly.

‘Phoebe!’ she cried, ’come here!  She looks strange and odd; her eyes are open, but don’t see me.  Phoebe!  Phoebe!’

‘Sure enough, she’s in a bad way!’ said Phoebe, climbing stiffly on to the bed to have a nearer view.  ‘Hold her head a little up t’ ease her breathin’ while I go for master; he’ll be for sendin’ for t’ doctor, I’ll be bound.’

Sylvia took her mother’s head and laid it fondly on her breast, speaking to her and trying to rouse her; but it was of no avail:  the hard, stertorous breathing grew worse and worse.

Sylvia cried out for help; Nancy came, the baby in her arms.  They had been in several times before that morning; and the child came smiling and crowing at its mother, who was supporting her own dying parent.

‘Oh, Nancy!’ said Sylvia; ‘what is the matter with mother? yo’ can see her face; tell me quick!’

Nancy set the baby on the bed for all reply, and ran out of the room, crying out,

‘Master! master!  Come quick!  T’ old missus is a-dying!’

This appeared to be no news to Sylvia, and yet the words came on her with a great shock, but for all that she could not cry; she was surprised herself at her own deadness of feeling.

Her baby crawled to her, and she had to hold and guard both her mother and her child.  It seemed a long, long time before any one came, and then she heard muffled voices, and a heavy tramp:  it was Phoebe leading the doctor upstairs, and Nancy creeping in behind to hear his opinion.

He did not ask many questions, and Phoebe replied more frequently to his inquiries than did Sylvia, who looked into his face with a blank, tearless, speechless despair, that gave him more pain than the sight of her dying mother.

The long decay of Mrs. Robson’s faculties and health, of which he was well aware, had in a certain manner prepared him for some such sudden termination of the life whose duration was hardly desirable, although he gave several directions as to her treatment; but the white, pinched face, the great dilated eye, the slow comprehension of the younger woman, struck him with alarm; and he went on asking for various particulars, more with a view of rousing Sylvia, if even it were to tears, than for any other purpose that the information thus obtained could answer.

’You had best have pillows propped up behind her—­it will not be for long; she does not know that you are holding her, and it is only tiring you to no purpose!’