The World Before Them Volume Ii Part 17

"He said it was a cancer." The old lady spoke slowly and with difficulty. "That it had been suffered to go too far, and at my age any operation in such a dangerous part was useless."

There was a long pause, only broken by the low sobbing of the two women.

"I don't mind dying, Dolly dear," continued Mrs. Rushmere, gathering courage to speak at last. "But oh, my pet! it is such a cruel death."

"May G.o.d give you strength to bear it, my dear mother," said Dorothy.

"This is sad news; it cuts me to the heart."

"I hope I may be spared to see Gilly again," continued Mrs. Rushmere, for a moment forgetful of her sad fate. "The doctor said that I might live for months, or even for years; but I only want to live long enough to look into his face once more."

After lying very still for a few minutes, she turned piteously to Dorothy, and continued--

"Dolly, if Gilbert should repent of his unkindness to you, would you forgive him?"

"Dear mother, I have done that long ago. How could I ask G.o.d to forgive me, and harbour resentment against anyone?"

"But would you marry him, if he wished it?"

Dorothy was silent. She felt in her heart that she no longer wished to be Gilbert Rushmere's wife, yet she did not wish to agitate Mrs.

Rushmere, by giving a flat negative to her question.

Her inward retrospection was interrupted by Mrs. Rushmere sinking back on her pillow, and gasping out, in a faint voice,

"Dorothy, you no longer love him?"

"Dear mother, these are useless and cruel questions. Gilbert will never put me to the trial of refusing him."

"But if a' did?"

"The answer to such an inquiry rightly belongs to the future. I know no more than you do how I might act. I trust in G.o.d that He would guide me to do what was right."

"And will you promise, Dorothy, not to leave me, till it is all over--till--till they have laid me in the clay?"

"That I can promise with my whole heart. Yes, dearest, best friend, set your mind at rest on that point. I will nurse you, and do everything that lies in my power to help you, and alleviate your sufferings. How could you imagine for a moment the possibility of your Dolly leaving you?"

"Ah, what a jewel that foolish boy threw recklessly way," sighed the good mother, as her adopted daughter left the room to make her a cup of tea.

A few days after this painful interview, the mail brought the news of the battle of Vittoria having been fought. Great was the public rejoicings on the occasion; a glad shout of triumph rang through the British Isles, proclaiming the victory their warlike sons had achieved.

It was only in those homes to which the messenger of death brought evil tidings of the loved and lost, that the voice of joy was mute.

Dorothy ran over to Jonathan Sly's to borrow the paper to read to old Rushmere, and in the list of the killed and wounded, found that Lieutenant Gilbert Rushmere had lost his right arm.

"Oh, father!" she cried, and suddenly stopped.

"Well, girl, out wi't. Dost think I'm not a man, that I can't bear the worst? Is Gilly killed?"

"No, thank G.o.d! but--but--he has lost his right arm."

"Lost his right arm! He had better ha' lost his life than return a cripple from the wars. Don't you see, girl, that this will put a stop to his promotion, an' make an idle pensioner of him--when, in these stirring times, he might ha' risen to be a general officer.

Dear--dear--dear! This is a terrible calamity. My boy--my brave boy!"

"Don't tell mother a word about it, father, it would kill her in her weak state," urged Dorothy.

"It won't vex her, Dorothy, as it does me. She has no ambition for her son. She would sooner ha' him sitting beside her with his one arm, so she had him safe at home, than know that he was commander o' the British army abroad. It will be as well to say nought about it, Dorothy, if you can keep it from her. My dear old woman--the loss o' her will be bad enough, wi'out this fresh trouble. Lost his right arm! Oh, my poor Gilly!"

Badly as Gilbert had behaved to her, Dorothy could better have borne the loss of her own arm. She still loved him well enough to feel truly grieved for his misfortune.

To a man of Gilbert's active habits, the want of that arm would be a dreadful calamity. She could not bear to think of the empty sleeve, hanging so uselessly beside his tall athletic figure. In all rural sports be had always been foremost, and never failed to carry off the prize. What would they do without him on the cricket ground--their best bat? What at the ploughing matches, where he had always turned the straightest furrow? In the hay and harvest fields, where he had no equal? Even in the boat races he had always pulled the best oar. And when his discarded love thought of these things, she retired to the solitude of her own chamber, and wept bitterly.

She thought that Lawrence Rushmere ought to have felt more grateful to G.o.d for sparing the life of his son. But the old man had been in the habit of speculating so much upon his rising to hold a high position in the army, that he could scarcely as yet realize the destruction of all his ambitious hopes.

This, together with the growing weakness of his wife, who, to do the old man justice, he loved better than anything in the world, tended much to sour his temper, and render it no easy matter to live at peace with him.

Directly Gerard Fitzmorris heard, through Mrs. Martin, of the troubles in the Rushmere family, he hastened to offer them the consolations of religion, and the sympathy of a true and benevolent heart. His pastoral visits were duly appreciated by the poor invalid and Dorothy, to whom they afforded the greatest comfort.

Mrs. Rushmere was a woman after the vicar's own heart. Her gentle resignation and genuine piety filled him with respect and admiration. He treated her as an affectionate son would do a beloved mother; soothing her in moments of intense suffering with his kind ministrations, and strengthening her mind with the blessed promises of the Gospel, to bear with submission the great burthen that had been laid upon her.

"The heavier the cross," he would say, "the brighter the crown. The more meekly it is borne, the sweeter will be the rest at the end of the journey."

Then he would join his fine mellow voice with Dorothy in singing the beautiful, though now forgotten, verse in the evening hymn: "For death is life, and labour rest." Even the blunt farmer's hard nature was softened by his touching prayers.

Mr. Fitzmorris did not exactly approve of Gilbert's loss being kept a profound secret from his mother.

"I hate all concealment," he cried. "The simple truth is always the best. You had better let me break it to her, than run the risk of her hearing it accidentally from another. The shock of seeing him with the empty sleeve, would give her more pain than if you were to make her acquainted with the facts."

Still, neither Dorothy nor Mr. Rushmere could be persuaded to follow his advice.

A very few days had elapsed before Dorothy deeply repented not adopting his judicious advice.

Though her disease was rapidly progressing, and Mrs. Rushmere was becoming daily weaker, she was still able to occupy the room below, propped up by pillows in her easy chair. The sight of all the household arrangements, and the inmates going to and fro, amused her, and often made her forgetful of the pain she was suffering.

One morning while Dorothy was absent in the outer kitchen, preparing some broth, Miss Watling, who had learned the extent of Gilbert's injuries, called upon Mrs. Rushmere to condole with her on the event, and pick up any bit of gossip she could with regard to Dorothy.

"Ah, my dear Mrs. Rushmere!" she cried, hurrying up to the easy chair, in which the old lady was reclining half asleep. "I am so sorry to find you sick and confined to the house. But you must not fret about Gilbert, indeed you must not. Directly I was told the dreadful news, I said to Mrs. Barford, 'Lord a' mercy, it will kill his poor mother.'"

"What about Gilbert! What dreadful news?" cried Mrs. Rushmere, starting from her half conscious state, and grasping the thin bony arm of her visitor with convulsive energy.

"Why, surely they must have told you that he was badly wounded in the great battle of Vittoria."

"Badly wounded. A great battle. Oh, my son! my son!" and the distressed mother fell back in her chair in a swoon.

At this moment, Dorothy entered with the broth for the invalid. One glance at the death pale face of Mrs. Rushmere told the whole story. She put down the basin and hurried to her a.s.sistance.

"Oh, Miss Watling!" she said in a deprecating voice. "See what you have done?"

"And what have I done? told the woman what she ought to have known three weeks ago."

"We had been keeping it from her," said Dorothy, "because she was not strong enough to bear it."